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A Tennessee state wide emergency response team consisting of joint members from 164th and 118th Airlift Wings, 134th Air Refueling Wing, Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) and the Emergency Management Agency (EMA) have been training in the ongoing Tennessee Maneuvers 2016 exercise (TNMAN ’16) this week here.
The exercise is designed to promote realism utilizing complex terrain, multiple partners, unique authorities and statutes to test and demonstrate catastrophic response capabilities.
“You have to build those injects to stress your folks out,” said Col. Andy Trautman, commander, 164th Mission Support Group, Memphis. “You have to take them to a point of failure, so you begin to develop where the gaps are and then you can plan to cover those gaps. You really have to push, in the exercise, everyone involved to their breaking point.”
During this exercise team members will be introduced to different emergency response scenarios caused by a simulated 6.5 magnitude earthquake affecting multiple states along the New Madrid Seismic Zone including Tennessee.
“We have a contingency response plan, and once we find out where the gaps are, we go back and we scrub those plans and determine how do we fix that,” said Trautman. “You hope that the plan stands the test of time after a catastrophic event.”
Synchronizing knowledge and expertise among state, civil and military organizations is one of the significant objectives of TNMAN ’16.
“One of the objectives is to establish relationships with our civilian agencies in a unified command setting to leverage those resources and capabilities,” said Col. Raymond Robinson, commander of the 164th AW. “It will enable us to better align our checklists with what we think will be closer to reality.”
The exercise is a great opportunity for Airmen and Soldiers of the Tennessee National Guard to work together.
“Until the deployments, we never really got the opportunity to work together,” said Lt. Col. Richie Gammons, commander of the 168th Military Police Battalion. “Now it enhances our capabilities. With the capabilities that the Army and the Air Force have, we can do anything.”
“I think the men and women of the 164th AW have done a phenomenal job of prepping the battlefield for receiving members of the 118th AW, 134th ARW and our Army brethren,” said Robinson. “It’s been an all-encompassing exercise that will serve us well across the state and enable us to return the city to some normal activity.”
| Date Taken: | 06.21.2016 |
| Date Posted: | 07.14.2016 13:08 |
| Story ID: | 203964 |
| Location: | KNOXVILLE , TN, US |
| Web Views: | 19 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Tennessee Maneuvers 2016 Excellent Joint Training, by TSgt Daniel Gagnon, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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