Ausindo Corpat 2012

Operation Ausindo Corpat a joint operation between the Australian and Indonesia Defense Forces has just concluded of our Northern Coast line. The operation, the third of its kind, was aimed at preventing and detecting illegal fishing and involved Navy patrol boats from both countries along without RAAF aircraft. The exercise began with high level meetings in the Indonesian port city of Kupang, immediately to the North of Ashmore Reef where the operation Ausindo Corpat was to be conducted. The crew aboard Royal Autralian Navy Armidal class Patrol Boat HMAS Pirie received a warm welcome at the Kupang warf from their Indonesian counterparts before Australian and Indonesian sailors gathered to plan joint exercise activities. The joint meetings provided the opportunity for formal discussions on cooperation between senior officers from both country's defense forces along with informal discussions between junior sailors from both Navy's as planning for the navigation and boarding party operations got underway. After the planning was over it was time to get to work with HMAS Pirie joined by two Indonisian Kakap class Patrol Boats on the water. Australian and Indonesian sailors form joint boarding parties on HMAS Piries rigid hull infliatable boats. The joint boarding exercises that followed twere hard work for the sailors with the full boarding party gear a challenge in the steamy tropical weather. It wasn't all work though the Australians took time out to teach their counterparts a thing or two about our favorite sports. *Navy personel cheer* The working relationship between the two groups of sailors came pretty easily according to the communications specialist aboard HMAS Pirie leading *** Julie Fairchild yea, no, its been really good working with the Indonisians, really easy and professional, um.. we thought the language barrier may play a part, but the Indonisians have very good English and they're tactical codes and they're voice procedure over the voice comunication is really good. "This is Pirie roger copied all out" Commanding Officer of HMAS Pirie Lieutenant Commander Mitchel Livingston said the operation helped his team build their skills in a range of operational areas. well i think it helps the team, you know what you can get out of them, when to push, when to stop, and uh... Basically you know you a better and uh... on another unit so it seems to work very well uh... yea, were a fairly tight team here and we get the job done fairly convincingly. Lieutenant Commander Livingstone said that with thousands of kilometers of shared borders these operations were important for both countries. working with our regonal neighbours for any reason, whether its to better carry out humanitarian aid or disaster relief or border patrols as we are doing at the moment the more we work with them the better it can get uh.. This exurcise Corpat is certainly a step up from last year so i expect next years will be a step up from this year ah.. the more we learn about how eachother oporates the better we work together it's fairly straightforward, certainly this year uh... we've learnt more about they're capabilities, what they can and cant do ah.. and see that helps our uh.. combined effort to patrol our Northern waters.