Warships from the 31st Surface Squadron train off the coasts of Galicia, Portugal and Cadiz during the MAR 23-1 naval exercises.

Spanish Navy F-100 frigates ‘Almirante Juan de Borbón’, ‘Méndez Núñez’, and ‘Cristóbal Colón’, set sail during the morning of February 5, to carry out this week a series of naval exercises in waters of the NW, W and SW of the Iberian peninsula. They will later be joined by ships of the Royal Canadian Navy and the US Navy, as well as Portuguese units (a frigate, a submarine and a maritime patrol aircraft), which will collaborate together in order to increase their training, and consolidate interoperability between the different navies as allies and members of NATO.

Under command of Navy Captain Gonzalo Leira, Commander of the 31st Surface Squadron, the ships will participate in an intense schedule of events focused on increasing their level of training in the field of maritime operations.

To achieve maximum practicality in the exercises, several elements from the Spanish Navy and the Air Force will also collaborate. They will be responsible for simulating different situations of tension and crisis within an environment of naval operations to generate in the units involved adequate responses to the different situations.

Several Marine Corps’ Operational Security Squads will embark on the ships to implement different maritime security and interdiction procedures including VBSS (visit, board, search and seizure) techniques. In this year’s edition, they will also embark MC’s Canine Units to test the adaptation of their dogs in the daily life on board the warships and their contribution in the tactical planning of the exercises.

The naval maneuvers of the ‘MAR’ series are organized biannually, and constitute one of the main training milestones for the ships of the 31st Surface Squadron.