AUBURN – A major U.S. Air Force Auxiliary Civil Air Patrol search and rescue exercise is scheduled to take place Saturday at the Auburn/Lewiston Municipal Airport. The exercise will involve several specially-equipped aircraft from around the state.

The purpose of the exercise is to polish USAF-Auxiliary members’ skills in both air and ground search-and-rescue operations. Air crews will attempt to find actual targets on the ground and, once found, dispatch highly-trained ground crews to the rescue sites. It’s expected that a number of sorties will be flown during the morning and early afternoon, keeping the skies surrounding the airport fairly busy with departing and landing small aircraft.

The USAF Auxiliary Civil Air Patrol is recognized as the nation’s leading organization of skilled volunteer aviation-based search-and-rescue personnel.