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| HMA Ships Canberra, Ballarat and Success along with HMNZS Te Kaha operate together off the Queensland coast with the aim of strengthening Task Group operating procedures |
LSIS Helen Frank (author),
ABIS Steven Thomson (photographer)
HMA Ships Canberra, Ballarat and Success have deployed with the Royal New Zealand Navy's HMNZS Te Kaha, to take part in Navy's first task group certification.
The task group was tested across the five warfare domains: land, air, maritime, space and cyber.
Commodore Warfare, Commodore Mal Wise, said he was impressed with the group's performance.
"Clearly the key elements of the task group had spent considerable time thinking about the challenges and they developed some original thinking to exploit those opportunities," Commodore Wise said.
"What that does is allow us to bring the task group together much more effectively.
"There is certainly much to learn but I think the foundations have been well laid."
Commodore Wise was onboard Canberra to assess the certification process.
"We have created a model to test and certify the task group. We tested and refined that model across the full spectrum of warfare and we will put it to the full test during Exercise TALISMAN SABRE 2017," he said.
TALISMAN SABRE is a biennial joint military exercise between Australia and the United States.
"By 2018 Navy aims to generate and deploy self-supported and sustainable maritime task groups capable of accomplishing the full spectrum of maritime security operations," Commodore Wise said.
"This certification activity is a key milestone," he said.
"We have already made significant steps to achieve task group operation but we have a long way to go and being able to measure that and support the delivery of the four ships at sea into a task group is a key component."