VIDEO
163d Attack Wing shares remotely piloted aircraft expertise with Philippine Air Force

by Staff Sgt. Joseph Pagan
163d Attack Wing Public Affairs

April 26, 2023

SUBIC BAY, Philippines – In an effort to strengthen ties and build camaraderie, members of the California Air National Guard and the Philippine Air Force joined together, shoulder to shoulder, for a subject matter expert exchange April 18-19, during Exercise Balikatan 2023.

"We're in the Philippines, specifically Subic International Airport. It is in Zamboanga City, about two hours from the capital of Manilla," said U.S. Air Force Capt. Timothy Nolan, an MQ-9 liaison officer with the 163d Attack Wing. "We just got to talking, build the relationship with the partners, asked each other where we're from and what our background is."

"We went to the briefing right after a very condensed brief as far as what the MQ-9 mission sets are and also the new software that we have available, which is again what we're exhibiting here in Subic for this exercise, and then eventually made our way to the hangar here to tour the MQ-9, see the aircraft as well as see all the support equipment and the portable control station that again is a part of that new package that enables us to do everything via satellite," Nolan said.

"If you would compare this aircraft to the Hermes, which is much smaller. The Hermes is the aircraft that the Philippine Air Force operates, their unmanned aircraft, this is significantly bigger," he said. "So when you open up the floor for questions and we noticed in the brief there were pretty significant questions that were actually hitting the topics that we discussed. So you know that definitely piqued their interest and obviously that was pretty telling that they want to learn more about the certain topic that we hit."

On the second day of the event at Fernando Air Base in Batangas. Members of the Philippine Air Force's 300th Air Intelligence and Security Wing briefed specifications of their own unmanned aerial vehicle, the Hermes 900.

As a sign of friendship and trust, the service members also traded military unit patches and enjoyed a traditional Filipino boodle fight meal together eating utensil-free.

"I mean, it's always been a tradition to share coins, share patches. It's almost like instead of taking a picture by them giving you that patch of that coin, it's like that's your snapshot in time," said Capt. Rene Miller, a maintenance officer in the wing. "So whenever you look at that on your desk, in your closet, in your room, whatever years down the road you're going to be like, 'I remember that day in Balikatan when we had a boodle fight and had a great time,'" Miller said.

"I think any exchange we have with a similar airframe or similar experiences makes us stronger as a whole," she said.