Page 8 - Cadet Review Summer 2019

Joint Service News
Queen Ethelburga’s Combined Cadet Force (CCF) deployed 14 cadets and 5 staff on Exercise Rooke’s Rock to Gibraltar in conjunction with 30 cadets and 7 staff from Yorkshire N&W ACF, 1 cadet
from Humberside and South Yorkshire ACF and 2 members of 4 Bde CTT. All cadets and staff were based at Devils Tower Camp which is parallel to one end of the runway of Gibraltar International airport and RAF Gibraltar; and home to the Royal Regiment of Gibraltar for nine days of activities. Having assembled at Queen Elizabeth Barracks, Strensall on Friday 12th April the party set off for Luton airport and our flight to Gibraltar on the Saturday morning.
The Exercise started on Sunday 14th April with a visit to the top of the Rock for a guided tour of some of the many fortifications and a talk on the history
of Gibraltar, and with no way of avoiding them the legendary Barbary apes. Cadets and adults alike soon learnt that any form of food or shiny item attracted the ape’s attention and if they wanted something, they usually got it. Quite a few ice creams and packed lunches were lost to the apes.
Quite a few ice creams and packed lunches were lost to the apes
On Monday the group had an induction to Gibraltar from staff at HQ British Forces Gibraltar and were then broken down into 2 platoons, mixing the CCF and ACF. This year unlike during other overseas exercises there was no need for weapons conversion to the regular forces L86A2 as there is an ACF detachment on the Rock and we were able to borrow their L98A2 weapons for our tactical training.
Tuesday found us on Buffadero Training Area at the extreme southern end of Gibraltar, a small but very well equipped training area on what must be one of the few flattish areas on the Rock. Our training was split in two, one group went through a shoot on the Dismounted Close Combat Trainer (DCCT) which was interesting as this DCCT has been adapted to the Blue Fire system i.e. no trailing cables and hoses, it uses nitrogen charged magazines and batteries in the rifle’s pistol grip to operate the weapon system via blue tooth connections. The other group were taken through some low level tactics training on the training area. This allowed the cadets to see the area that they would be working in for their Training in
8 CADET REVIEW SUMMER 2019