Exercise Cormoran 2021 “An exercise with ambition”

In 2021, the French Navy (la Marine Nationale) and the French Army (l’Armée de Terre) organised an exercise called “Cormoran 21 an exercise with ambition”. Previous Cormoran exercises were conducted with only one helicoptercarrier “porte-hélicoptères amphibie” (PHA) of the amphibious Mistral class of helicopter carriers. In this year’s edition, two PHAs were involved: the PHA Tonnerre and the PHA Mistral.

Two amphibious helicopter carriers not only gave double striking power, but also increased the planning burden to get all ships and helicopters at the right place and at the right time. More planning, more communication and more synchronisation were needed by the French Navy (Marine Nationale), the French Army (l’Armée de Terre) and the boarded Army helicopters of the ALAT (Aviation Légère de l’Armée de Terre).

From 27 September until 15 October 2021, the Naval Air Mobile Group (Groupe Naval AéroMobile, GNAM) conducted Exercise Cormoran 21 in the Mediterranean Sea. Some 1,500 soldiers from the French Navy and the Army were engaged in this high-intensity exercise. For the first time, a GNAM consisting of two amphibious helicopter carriers, the PHA Tonnerre and PHA Mistral, deployed with two airmobile groups with a total of 24 combat helicopters, as well as a support group.

Each amphibious helicopter carrier carried 12 helicopters onboard, the PHA Tonnerre carried the helicopters of the 1RHC, the PHA Mistral carried a mix of 3RHC and 5RHC helicopters.

The exercise was commanded by a joint staff, deployed aboard the PHA Tonnerre. The staff was made up half of soldiers from the ‘Force Aéromaritime Française de Réaction Rapide’ (FRMARFOR, the Aeromaritime Rapid Reaction Force) and other half contained soldiers of the the 4e Brigade d’AéroCombat (4e BAC, 4th Air Combat Brigade, based at Clermont-Ferrand (FR)). The helicopter carriers were escorted by a number of battleships that would protect the ships from air and sea threats.

PHA helicopter carriers

The Porte-Hélicoptères Amphibie (PHA, Amphibious Helicopter Carrier) PHA Mistral (L9013) and PHA Tonnerre (L9014) belongs to the Mistral class of French amphibious helicopter carriers. The whole class consists of three ships, together with the sistership PHA Dixmude (L9015). Originally, two additional Mistral-class PHAs were built for the Russian Navy but after the Russian annexation of the Crimea, these were sold to the Egyptian Navy.

These PHAs have three large diesel engines and a smaller spare diesel engine, that use their power to drive alternators that produce electric power for the ship.100 per cent electric power is used to drive the two large propellers and they will give the ship a speed of some eighteen knots.

With a length of nearly 200 meters, the PHAs can store four embarkment barges in a submersible dock, 40 LeClerc tanks, 70-100 trucks, 400-500 armed soldiers and some 15-20 helicopters, depending on their size.

Cormoran leadership

The GNAM (Groupe Naval Aéromobile) command is currently under command of Marine Admiral Christophe Cluzel, and its deputy commander is Armée de Terre General Frédéric Barbry. GNAM is responsible for the CORMORAN exercise and both Admiral Cluzel and General Barbry were present onboard of the PHA Tonnerre and during a press meeting, both officers mentioned the unique challenges, opportunities and ambitions to work with 2 helicopter carriers at the same time, during the whole 3 weeks of the exercise.

Cormoran exercise planning

Colonel Hubert is the Cormoran exercise director and he explained how the GNAM (Groupe Naval AéroMobile) prepares and executes this exercise. In order to get all cards rightly placed, it requires immense planning of more than an year to execute this exercise. The GNAM role was to intervene and to remove the invader.

The first ten days of the exercise were used for familiarisation and integration, to learn to operate from the amphibious carriers by day and by night in large helicopter formations. Three raids were planned involving the two carriers, with increasing difficulties.The first two raids were into the mainland of France, while the third and last raid was the night raid into the Solenzara airbase (Base Aerienne 126 “Solenzara”, ICAO code LFKS) at Corsica.

In order to increase the complexity for the planners and the participants, a Forward Operating Base (FOB) was established on Corsica. Transport helicopters then set up a supply line to transfer cargo and soldiers between the two carriers and the FOB. While the other helicopters were performing the actual raid on Solenzara airbase. This all during the night, with no or minimal radio transmission, under a very hostile environment.

Planning challenges with ambitions

The helicopters can be transported from the hangar deck to the flight deck with two elevators, one on the right side near the stern for helicopters with folded rotors and another one on the stern for helicopters with unfolded or fixed rotors. On deck, there were six launch positions during daytime operations and for security reasons only five launch positions during nighttime operations. The launch positions can only be reached from the stern of the ship. The six or five of launch positions plus the elevators with different capacities, gave planners an ‘ambitious’ headache when a large number of helicopters were needed to be launched in a short time frame. As the Tigre attack helicopters can not fold their rotors, they can only be transported via the stern elevator, but they can take-off fast due to the fact that there is no time needed to unfold the rotors. Other helicopters can use the side elevator, but they need more time to unfold the rotors on deck. Also helicopters with folded rotors can easily be moved around the flight deck, which is less easy for helicopters with unfolded rotors .

Besides the ‘ambitious’ deck planning, the fuel capacity of the various helicopter types was also an ‘ambitious’ planning headache as the Gazelle helicopters have a smaller fuel capacity than the Tigre and NH90 helicopters. So the Gazelle helicopters would be the last helicopters to leave the carrier and they would return first; while the Tigres, NH90s and Cougar helicopters loitered around the carriers until the helicopter formation was established.

And as the launch raid for 12 to 16 helicopters was planned ahead, the return of these helicopters was at random, with various fuelstates, giving even more headaches to the handlers to move the helicopter to the hangar deck fast.