Exercise Mobility Guardian in Townsville, Darwin, Cairns preparing United States, Australia

Moving an M1 Abrams tank half way around the globe or doing an emergency medical airlift from Italy to the US to save a life is all a day’s work for one United States Air Force pilot currently in Townsville.

Exercise Mobility Guardian. USAF pilot Captain Stefan Curcic with 'Moose' the C-17 Globemaster he pilots at RAAF Base Townsville. Picture: Evan Morgan

Moving an M1 Abrams battle tank half way around the globe or doing an emergency medical airlift from Italy to the US to save a life is all a day’s work for one United States Air Force pilot currently in Townsville for Exercise Mobility Guardian (MG23).

Captain Stefan Curcic pilots a USAF C-17 Globemaster, and his plane, affectionately known as Moose, is capable of flying 4480km non-stop and has a maximum load capacity of 77,500kg.

Captain Curcic is currently based at RAAF Townsville, which is the operational hub for three US C-17 Globemaster III aircraft, along with more than 250 USAF personnel for the exercise.

MG23 is the USAF Air Mobility Command’s largest full-spectrum readiness exercise in the command’s history, and is operating for the first time outside the US.

The exercise, being undertaken in the Indo-Pacific region, includes Townsville, Cairns and Darwin.

Exercise Mobility Guardian. Loadmaster Senior Airman Dmitry Kazantsev in the cargo bay of a C-17 Globemaster at RAAF Base Townsville. Picture: Evan Morgan

Captain Curcic said MG23 was a way for the USAF to work with their allies and partners across a wide variety and wide spectrum of domains including airlift, aeromedical, evacuation, global command controlling, humanitarian disaster and relief.

“It’s really a way for us to increase and hone our readiness and our interoperability with all of our partner countries, and not just Australia, it’s New Zealand, it’s France, it’s a bunch of our key allies and partners.”

Exercise Mobility Guardian. USAF pilots Major Justin Edwards and Captain Stefan Curcic with Moose, the C-17 Globemaster they pilot, at RAAF Base Townsville. Picture: Evan Morgan

He said that a key aspect of the exercise was learning how their allies operated, and at the same time learn from each other.

“I just flew a mission a couple of days ago integrating with the Australian aeromedical evacuation team and our aeromedical evacuation team,” Captain Curcic said.

“We set up a set up a station with a couple of simulated critical care patients and we flew to a couple of locations within Australia, and really our aeromedical evacuation team and their aeromedical evacuation team, integrating exchanging ideas and working together was pretty cool.

“From the pilot side, we got to do a practice emergency descent from 31,000 feet while simulating a critical care patient’s needs.

A USAF C-17 Globemaster at RAAF Base Townsville as part of Exercise Mobility Guardian. Picture: Evan Morgan

“Getting to see how the Australians handle that sort of stuff versus how we do it, and really taking those ideas away from each other.”

The captain said the best real-life mission he had been involved with was to save a life.

“I can tell you the coolest mission that I’ve done. It was actually an aeromedical evacuation real-life,” Captain Curcic said.

“We flew a critical care patient from Italy at a moment’s notice. I was in Germany at the time and they cut us last minute and we brought him all the way over from Italy to Joint Base Andrews (in the US) to get the care that he needed.

“Our rapidness and integration with the AED side of the house, the aeromedical evacuation side of the house – we were able to ensure that he got the care that he needed and saved his life.”

RAAF Base Townsville senior officer Wing Commander Naomi Gill said MG23 was part of a series of exercises which involved the base.

Mobility Guardian is part of one of the exercises for the Northern Air Campaign.

“We’ve seen that we’ve had Exercise Black Dagger and Exercise High Sierra already, and we’re preparing for Talisman Sabre as well,” Wing Commander Gill said.

“What we do as the Airbase Operations Squadron is provide support to these exercises to project air power.

“We ensure that we look after the fuel, we look after the movements of the aircraft on the ground.”

MG23 runs through to July 21.

Originally published as Exercise Mobility Guardian in Townsville, Darwin, Cairns preparing United States, Australia