Royal Air Force Typhoons from 140 Expeditionary Air Wing (EAW), deployed to Romania on enhanced Air Policing have joined Exercise Astral Knight 24, conducting an Integrated Air & Missile Defense (IAMD) exercise in Poland.
More than 50 serving personnel from 140 EAW flew out from Mihail Kogalniceanu Airbase to the 31st Air Base in Krzesiny, commonly known as Poznań-Krzesiny Airport, to support 3 Typhoons from IX(Bomber) Squadron performing joint air operations with the Polish Air Force F-16’s.
Exercise Astral Knight 24 has been identified as being part of the Large-Scale Global Exercise (LSGE) which drives requirement to present a multi-regional Integrated Air & Missile Defense dilemma to the Combined Forces Commander. With 5000 personnel from six nations, Astral Knight is the capstone IAMD exercise with the UK contingent working alongside their US, Lithuanian, Greek, Danish and Polish counterparts as we continue to strengthen our links with the Baltic states.
“Our role in the exercise is conducting DCA, which stands for Defensive Counter Air, we're going up and acting in very much defensive posture against a simulated attack on European countries.
“There's been a lot of nations contributing to this exercise, and we've all learned a lot from each other on how to move forward as part of NATO. It has been a very successful mission and the Polish Air Force have supported us fantastically. We're very grateful for all their support throughout the exercise, and we look forward to working with them again in the near future.”
Flight Lieutenant Clarke, RAF Typhoon Pilot
RAF ground personnel have been working closely with the Polish Air Force 1st Maintenance Unit, The Ravens.
“As a Polish speaker it's given me the opportunity to help the detachment integrate better with the Polish Air Force, building better relations at all levels. Working with the Polish Air Force has been a very good experience for our personnel. They have modern aircraft similar to our own and are very keen to learn from us as we are from them.”
Squadron Leader Bernett, 140 EAW Ex Astral Knight Detachment Commander
Once the exercise is concluded, the Squadron will go back to Romania to continue Operation Biloxi, which is carrying out enhanced air policing from Romania and after that they will head back to RAF Lossiemouth to begin their work to deploy on Op Shader.
