Send in the troops
Hundreds of soldiers coming to Prince County for training exercise, will help Summerside Boys and Girls Club
Expect to start seeing a lot of camouflage around Prince County this fall. The 4 Engineering Support Regiment of the Canadian Forces, based in Gagetown, N.B., is being deployed near Summerside, starting in October, for Exercise NIHILO SAPPER 2018. More than 450 soldiers are expected to take part, from Nov. 1 to 22. “We’re looking forward to coming to Prince Edward Island,” said Captain Jamie Tobin, a military spokesman. “We’re looking forward to the warm hospitality that only the Island can offer.” The soldiers are likely to need all the warmth they can get as they will be roughing it during their stay. NIHILO SAPPER is an annual training exercise in which the regiment practices one of its most important functions, building bases and infrastructure. Soldiers from the regiment are currently in Mali, building helicopter landing pads to support the United Nations Peacekeeping mission underway in the African nation. On P.E.I. the unit will be constructing a camp capable of supporting 500 soldiers for the duration of their stay here. It will be somewhere in the Summerside area. An advanced group will also be on the ground starting in late October while a second group will stay behind into December to remediate the temporary camp. The regiment has been holding these annual training missions for many years, but it has only been two years since it started moving the location around. Traditionally the soldiers never left the Gagetown area, but in 2016 they went to Bathurst, N.B., and in 2017 to Cape Breton, N.S.
In addition to building the camp, the regiment also spends time helping with community projects in the regions it visits. The local group supplies the materials and the regiment provides the building expertise and muscle to do the work. In Cape Breton soldiers helped build walking trails and a bridge in Cape Breton Highlands National Park and re-shingled the roof of a historic stone church. There are a number of projects planned across P.E.I. that soldiers will help with, but the only one Tobin could confirm Tuesday was renovations to the Summerside Boys and Girls Club. “It’s a great opportunity to give back, do something for the community; because we get a lot of great support from Canadians right across this country.” “These soldiers need training, these soldiers have skills they need to maintain and using those skills to better the community – there is no better pairing.” Anyone interested in getting a look at the regiment’s work up close will have an opportunity. A day for the public to visit the camp is being planned. A date and time will be announced later.