JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, Hawaii – Enlisted military members and officers from Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Japan, Republic of the Philippines, and the United States participated in marine species awareness training during the Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) 2018 exercise at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam July 5.
Steve Loeffler, ASW Environmental Compliance Team Lead, facilitated the required training for RIMPAC participants in preparation for the sea phase of the exercise.
“It’s the first step the Navy has for lookout training, to familiarize themselves with what marine mammals are, why they’re important as part of our regulatory rules, and then how to identify what they’re looking at,” he said.
Points of emphasis for the training included awareness of the presence of various marine species, including whales, dolphins, seals, turtles, coral, and how the presence of these different species may impact portions of the RIMPAC exercise.
Twenty-five nations, 46 ships, five submarines, about 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel are participating in RIMPAC from June 27 to Aug. 2 in and around the Hawaiian Islands and Southern California. The world’s largest international maritime exercise, RIMPAC provides a unique training opportunity while fostering and sustaining cooperative relationships among participants critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and security of the world’s oceans. RIMPAC 2018 is the 26th exercise in the series that began in 1971.