The first multinational European exercise focusing on manual neutralisation of explosive devices, European Guardian 2014, started this week in Vienna, Austria.
The exercise, which runs from 1- 12 September, brings together explosive disposal experts from five countries, the lead nation Austria, Germany, Italy, Ireland, and Sweden.
Improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, present a challenge to Explosive Ordnance Disposal operators. This is particularly true when there is little time to render the device safe or when the circumstances make it impossible to use different means but the operator’s skills to safely defuse the device.
In order to tackle these highly dangerous situations, and to deal with complex devices, operators need to have a high level of experience and training. European Guardian 2014 is designed to provide the specialist training that experts from EDA Member States require.
European Guardian is part of the EDA’s Manual Neutralisation Training Courses & Exercise (MNT C&E) Programme. MNT C&E is designed to provide exercises and training courses to experienced Improvised Explosives Devises Disposal (IEDD) operators in order to accomplish proper threat assessments and course action planning as well to analyse complex IED’s in different circumstances.