STUTTGART, Germany – U.S. Army Garrison Stuttgart tested its readiness and a new mobile application during a force protection exercise Aug. 11-13 across its installations located in Böblingen, Filderstadt, Möhringen, Vaihingen and Zuffenhausen, Germany.
The three-day exercise was designed to assess the garrison’s ability to identify potential threats and respond by enhancing protection at its five installations.
“Terrorism is an ongoing worldwide threat to our nation, which is why understanding that threat and implementing protective measures is essential for maintaining Army Readiness,” said Luke Fralick, USAG Stuttgart’s antiterrorism officer.
During the exercise, the Force Protection Condition (FPCON) was increased, activating changes in security procedures such as vehicle inspections and increased access control measures.
“We all play a role in keeping our communities safe. This FPCON exercise is just one example of how our garrison and our community work together to continuously protect our installations, people and information, said Robert Taylor, USAG Stuttgart’s protection chief.
For the first time during an exercise, the garrison public affairs office shared vital information about the exercise directly with members of the community though the My Army Post App (MAPA), the Army’s new mobile application designed to communicate timely and accurate installation information directly to users.
During force protection exercises, communication is key. Enhanced security measures naturally increase traffic at the front gates, and some non-essential garrison-based offices and services close or adjust their hours to reduce the traffic volume, allowing emergency-essential personnel to get through the gate faster. Clearly and directly communicating these rapid changes to the community can be challenging.
“During the previous exercise, we were so busy answering emails, Facebook comments, direct messages and phone calls about what was opened or closed. While we posted notices on social media with links to the list of closures on our website, we couldn’t ensure everyone was notified fast enough,” said USAG Stuttgart Director of Public Affairs Dayna Rowden. “We needed an easier way to share timely information to our users and for the community to pull information about office closures or service interruptions.”
The easier way ended up being MAPA.
“Our success during this exercise actually started at the end of January when Andrea Ryan started her detail (from 7th Army Training Command) with us,” said Rowden. “Within six weeks, Andrea taught herself how to use the program and created our MAPA from scratch. By the end of March, she oversaw the creation of than 300 listings by training all our MAPA resource managers how to directly access and edit their listings, contact information, websites, operating hours and events. I now call her the MAPA Maven.”
During the exercise, the public affairs office proved MAPA’s mettle and attracted more users.
“Our preparation really paid off during the exercise. Within a short amount of time, we notified the community of the exercise, pushed out links to our websites, and adjusted the operating status of more than 120 offices and services,” said Ryan. “MAPA worked! No one called us to ask if anything was opened or closed during the exercise, and we got a lot more users. Since we launched MAPA, we averaged about 10 new users a day. In the past week, this rate jumped to 80 new MAPA users a day!”
FPCON exercises like this highlight the importance of rehearsal, readiness, and collective responsibility.
| Date Taken: | 08.13.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 08.29.2025 15:21 |
| Story ID: | 546910 |
| Location: | STUTTGART, BADEN-WURTTEMBERG, DE |
| Web Views: | 28 |
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