From U.S. Fleet Forces Command Public Affairs

NORFOLK (NNS) — Commander, United States Fleet Forces (USFF) and Commander, Marine Corps Forces Command (MARFORCOM) will lead the East Coast’s largest joint and multinational amphibious assault exercise in the past ten years officials announced Jan. 25.

Exercise Bold Alligator 2012 (BA12) will revitalize Navy and Marine Corps amphibious expeditionary tactics, techniques and procedures, and reinvigorate its culture of conducting combined Navy and Marine Corps operations from the sea.

BA12 will be a live and synthetic, scenario-driven, simulation-supported exercise designed to train Expeditionary Strike Group 2 (ESG 2), 2d Marine Expeditionary Brigade (2d MEB) and Carrier Strike Group 12. Staffs will plan and execute a MEB-sized amphibious assault from a seabase in a medium land-and-maritime threat environment to improve naval amphibious core competencies.

The exercise will run Jan. 30 through Feb. 12, ashore and afloat, in and off the coasts of Virginia, North Carolina and Florida

“Amphibious forces are a critical element of maritime power projection that ought to be a high priority for support, even in a resource constrained environment, because they are a cost effective option for accomplishing a wide range of military operations,” said Adm. John C. Harvey, commander, USFF.

The units involved include the Enterprise Carrier Strike Group (CSG), Expeditionary Strike Group 2 (ESG-2), 2d Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB), Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group (ARG), 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), Naval Expeditionary Combat Command (NECC) as well as various other ships and units.

Nine countries are participating in exercise BA12, providing maritime, land and air units or observers. The countries participating with the U.S. forces are Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain and the United Kingdom.

One of the exercise’s priorities is to incorporate lessons learned over the past 10 years of challenging combat operations, overseas contingency operations, humanitarian assistance/disaster relief (HA/DR), noncombatant evacuation operations (NEO) and homeland defense.

The exercise will focus on the fundamental aspects and roles of amphibious operations to improve amphibious force readiness and proficiency for executing the six core capabilities of the Maritime Strategy – forward presence, deterrence, sea control, power projection, maritime security and humanitarian assistance/disaster response.

“In today’s world, the Navy-Marine Corps team must remain capable of gaining access to an operational area, and projecting and sustaining a sizable landing force ashore,” said Lt. General Dennis Hejlik, Commander, MARFORCOM. “We have the legislated responsibilities to be able to conduct these operations, and we certainly must be ready to do so beyond the ARG-MEU level where we routinely operate today.”

The culmination of Bold Alligator 2012 will include three large-scale events within the exercise: an amphibious assault at Camp Lejeune, N.C.; an aerial assault from the sea into Fort Pickett, Va.; and an amphibious raid on Fort Story, Va.

Embedded within their participation in BA12 is the Enterprise CSG’s Joint Task Force Exercise (JTFEX); the Iwo Jima (ARG) and 24th MEU certification exercise (CERTEX); and Riverine Group 1 (RIVGRU 1) Maritime Security Operations Ready (MSO-R) certification by Naval Expeditionary Combat Command (NECC).

For more history and information on Bold Alligator 2012, see Harvey’s blog at http://www.usfleetforces.blogspot.com/.

For more information, visit www.navy.mil, www.facebook.com/usnavy, or www.twitter.com/usnavy. Join the conversation about Bold Alligator 2012 on social media using #BA12.

For more news from U.S. Fleet Forces Command, visit http://www.navy.mil/local/clf/.

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By Larry Shaughnessy, CNN Pentagon ProducerAugust 30, 2011 8:36 a.m. EDT

Aboard The Uss Wasp (CNN) — Three U.S. Navy ships were stationed a short helicopter ride from New York Harbor as the sun rose Tuesday, ready to lend a hand to states ravaged by Irene.

Located just over the horizon from New York Harbor, the USS Wasp, the USS New York and the USS San Antonio are on call should civilian authorities need their help in northern New Jersey, southern New York and Connecticut, Rear Adm. Kevin Scott told CNN.

The MH-53 and MH-60 helicopters on board are ideally suited for search and rescue missions.

Some of the MH-60s come equipped with a highly sensitive infrared camera that could help a pilot spot the body heat of a person trapped by flood water in a tree or on the roof of a car.

If sent in to help, the helicopters would carry Navy divers who are trained for water rescues.

The ships could sail up or down the East Coast if help is needed outside the tri-state region, Scott said.

While the ships may return to port without ever receiving orders to assist, Scott said this mission has been extremely valuable for the Navy, because it gives the Navy a chance to apply what it learned about humanitarian relief after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Because the Navy is busy with missions all over the world, including Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and the fight against fighting piracy off Somalia, this kind of training is rare.

Sailors aboard the Wasp brushed up on their disaster response skills Monday as helicopter pilots practiced takeoffs and landings on the flight deck.

The Tiger Team — a group of sailors from all over the ship who volunteered to go ashore and help hurricane victims — got refresher briefings on everything from how to handle disaster victims to how to chain saw safety to how to deal with news reporters.

The training is scheduled to start again first thing after breakfast Tuesday, Scott said, unless orders for real-life hurricane relief interrupt.

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By Larry Shaughnessy, CNN Pentagon ProducerAugust 28, 2011 8:39 p.m. EDT

Aboard The Uss Wasp (CNN) — The Navy is sending three amphibious ships towards the New York and New England region in anticipation that the ships may be called upon to assist civilian authorities responding to Hurricane Irene, according to a spokesman for the Navy on the USS Wasp.

The Wasp, according to Lt. Cmdr. Jim Krohne, will be joined by the USS Oak Hill and the USS New York — a ship built in part with steel from the wreckage of the World Trade Center. Now the ship-born-of-a-man-made-tragedy is prepared to help its namesake city respond to a natural disaster.

The three ships are all capable of providing helicopters and floating landing craft for a wide array of humanitarian response, including search-and-rescue, road and debris clearing, emergency communications, emergency medical support, and even an air-traffic control if needed.

Krohne said the three ships — part of a larger unit called Amphibious Task Force 26 — are expected to arrive off the Northeast coast on Monday. They will be able to start flying aid in as the ships get within 120 miles from the area they would be helping.

But the whole mission is still a matter of preparedness, because no official orders have been given to the Navy to start having the ships join the relief effort.

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