Members of the U.S. Coast Guard and the Hawai’ian county of Kauai teamed up Aug. 12 for a search and rescue exercise off the island’s southern coast.
The exercise, which takes place bi-annually, allows agencies to review notification and response procedures and point out any response communication and coordination issues between the agencies. In this exercise, agencies responded to a simulated call from a person concerned about an overdue paddler.
Participants in this year’s exercise included members of Coast Guard Sector Honolulu; Coast Guard Station Kauai; Coast Guard Air Station Barbers Point; the Kauai Fire Department; the Kauai Police Department; the Lihue Airport Fire Department; the Kauai Ocean Safety Bureau; the Kauai Emergency Management Agency; and the Civil Air Patrol.
“Nothing builds great working relationships between partners better than exercises such as this,” said Chief Petty Officer Timothy Elhajj, the officer in charge of Coast Guard Station Kauai. “These exercises are great because they allow us to work with our counterparts in a training environment allowing us to be better prepared for real world events in the future.”
