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EODMU 5 holds field training exercise in Guam
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Posted on Feb 16 2012
By GABRIELLE BLAKE
Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class
Joint Region Edge Staff
SANTA RITA, Guam-Sailors assigned to Explosive Ordnance Disposal Mobile Unit 5 went through a five-day joint field-training exercise with the Guam National Guard in Yigo, Guam Feb. 6-9.
“We came out and set out an expeditionary base camp and then had three EOD teams deployed out to do problems that they would normally encounter in our area of operations,” said EODMU 5 battalion leading chief petty officer Senior Chief Explosive Ordnance Technician Isaac Callicrate.
The training included counter improvised explosive device training, training-to-combat terrorism and working with GUNG to do security patrols and other integration training.
“Right now there’s no one person or one command in the areas where we have conflicts, it is all a joint effort,” Callicrate said. “So we try to get the joint concept as soon as we can in the training cycle to make sure that our sailors are used to working with the Army, Marine Corps and Air Force.”
EOD technicians set up a combat control center where networks and communication systems were put in place, providing reach-back capability and voice and data communications between the battalion, GUNG, and the EOD teams in the field.
“It was definitely a learning experience,” Information Systems Technician 1st Class Donny Athan said. “I never tried to coordinate two different services moving together, working together.”
EODMU 5 deploys and employs tailored EOD units to locate, identify, render safe and remove conventional, chemical, biological, nuclear, radiological, and improvised explosive hazards in order to enable access for joint, naval, and special operations forces within the Western Pacific Theater of Operations and elsewhere, when directed.
