Residents of the U.S Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico can expect increased aircraft noise and activity for the next 10 days as Exercise Caribbean Fox — a critical training event hosted by the 169th Fighter Wing, assigned to the South Carolina Air National Guard — gets underway.
The exercise, which will be based on St. Croix, begins on Wednesday and will continue through July 26, according to Capt. Marcia C. Bruno, state public affairs officer for the Virgin Islands National Guard.
“While we understand that increased noise can be disruptive, this training is essential to maintain combat readiness,” said 2nd Lt. Nicole Szews, 169th Fighter Wing public affairs officer.
Exercises like Caribbean Fox provide a dynamic training experience for the warfighter to maintain readiness to integrate, operate and dominate air superiority across the full spectrum of conflict, according to Bruno, who issued a noise advisory on Tuesday.
Caribbean Fox trains lethal, adaptable forces by incorporating advanced tactics and counter strategies to strengthen the member’s ability to intuitively anticipate, identify and overcome adversarial threats, the advisory stated.
“This exercise will build on what we learned during Exercise Typhoon Fox earlier this year,” said Col. Michael Ferrario, 169th Fighter Wing commander.
“During Typhoon Fox our focus was Agile Combat Employment (ACE) and evaluating our recently trained Mission Ready Airmen. Caribbean Fox will take those airmen, and others assigned to the 169th Fighter Wing, relocate them to St. Croix, a semi-austere environment with limited resources, to challenge their effectiveness in carrying out mission-critical tasks while employing combat airpower to deter and defeat the highest level of adversary capabilities,” said Ferrario.
The exercise also includes support from the 134th Air Refueling Wing and 164th Airlift Wing from the Tennessee Air National Guard.
