The Navy wants to make sure people aren’t alarmed when they hear automatic gun fire coming from its area bases over the next couple of weeks.
Starting Monday, Naval Station Mayport, Naval Air Station Jacksonville and Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay in Georgia will be engaged in a terrorism response drill called Exercise Solid Curtain-Citadel Shield 2018.
NS Mayport emergency manager Steve Millican said the annual two week exercise will test their ability — and that of civilian first responders — to handle any threat, on or off base.
“We will have Jax Beach law enforcement, JSO coming to the base to assist us. We’ll have JFRD coming to assist us on the medical side and any firefighting we’re going to be doing. So it’s how those networks operate inside and outside the fence line,” said Millican.
All most people will notice during the course of the exercise is some odd noises and more traffic, according to Millican.
“We’re not changing any normal activity that we have. So if you’ve got an appointment at medical, that appointment’s going to be kept. If you want to come to the golf course and play golf, that’ll happen. If you need to go to PSC to get an ID card, you can still do that. You just have to be aware these exercises are occurring and to allow yourself more time,” said Millican.
The Navy’s terrorism-response exercise will run from Monday, January 29 through Friday, February 9.
Contact reporter Cyd Hoskinson at choskinson@wjct.org, 904-358-6351 and on Twitter @cydwjctnews.
