Seahawks Hunt US Submarine

27 July 2011

(L-R) Trainee Aviation Engineering Officer, Sub Lieutenant Sangha Komal, and 816 Squadron Detachment Commander, Lieutenant Commander Helen Anderson, prepare a Royal Australian Navy N24 Sea Hawk Helicopter for a familiarisation flight on July 22 at Rockhampton airport during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2011.

Three 816 Squadron Seahawk helicopters and a detachment of 85 Royal Australian Navy personnel based at Bundaberg airport conducted anti-submarine and surface warfare operations with the United States Navy (USN) during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2011 (TS11).

Working with both Australian and USN ships, the ‘Fighting Tigers’ dropped sonar buoys into the water and used the Seahawk helicopters’ on board acoustic, radar and infrared systems to hunt for a USN submarine.

Detachment Commander and Operations Officer for 816 Squadron, Lieutenant Commander Helen Anderson, said the highlight of TS11 for the squadron was the contact time they had achieved with the USN submarine.

“We conducted a number of serialised and war-ex events. Sometimes the submarine made itself easy to find – other times it was very difficult to find. TS11 has provided us with valuable anti-submarine warfare training,” Lieutenant Commander Anderson said.

She said USN personnel were “an absolute pleasure to work with”.

“They controlled us during parts of the exercise and we also landed on board some of their ships to refuel and transfer passengers.

“As always, it has been good operating with the Americans. They train to the same high standards as we do and we didn’t have any issues working with them. In fact, working with them was almost as smooth as with one of our own Australian Navy ships.”