Northrop Grumman’s Mission Systems Europe Operation Provides Tracking Communication System For Leadership, Development Training Exercise For British Army Officer Cadets

Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) announced that its Mission Systems Europe operation has provided the tracking communications system for a leadership and development training exercise that was undertaken this month by 11 Army officer cadets from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in a recreation of the Second World War mission, Operation Frankton.

The Gironde estuary is wide and busy with commercial shipping and fast currents. It is also prone to being blanketed with thick fog. Northrop Grumman’s C2PC Tactical was used to track the canoes as they progressed up river enabling them to stay out of shipping lanes and away from hazardous areas.

In the original 1942 raid, ten Royal Marines in five military Klepper folding canoes, launched from a British submarine, paddled 70 miles up the River Gironde in France in order to sink enemy merchant ships docked in Bordeaux harbor.

Northrop Grumman provided the C2PC Tactical command and control/situational awareness system for tracking commercial shipping activity and the progress of the canoes as well as for navigation.

“We are delighted to have been able to support this challenging leadership and development exercise with the use of our equipment,” said Paul Davison, vice-president and managing director of Northrop Grumman Missions Systems Europe. “This has been a further opportunity to demonstrate the capability of our C2PC Tactical system in a demanding mission environment.”

The officers in the reconstruction canoed the same route as the original raiding party using military Kleppers, but had the benefit of modern military tracking devices on their canoes, which allowed their progress to be followed in near real time. Each carried state-of-the-art military blue force tracking devices to provide an up-to-date situational awareness picture for those tracking the operation.

The exercise, from its planning in the UK to the recreation of the mission itself, was filmed by an independent film company and will be broadcast on UK national television in October 2007.