With almost 7,500 kilometers of coastline, and situated in the middle of a 'hot sea' of legal and illegal trading, Italy has been forced to maximise its resources in order to manage and maintain its national interests involving the marine environment. As a result, operational units of the Italian Guardia Costiera (Coast Guard) are fighting on the front lines of war against illegal trafficking of arms, drugs and people, while currently managing environmental disaster, monitoring pollution levels and carrying out SAR duties.
The Coast Guard is an operational branch of the Corpo delle Capitanerie di Porto (CP - Corps of the Port Captaincies), and the air component of the force derives its mandate from this authority to protect Italian territorial waters. To execute these functions, a new operational branch was created and specially equipped with aircraft and surface vessels. In 1988, this branch merged with the Coast Guard. The newborn service was given the difficult task of coordinating and managing the SAR activities at sea, in the air and on land, with its own craft or with the help of other civil and military rescue units.
As well as SAR missions, the operational duties of the Guardia Costiera were extended to include: maritime patrol for immigration control; pèolicing maritime traffic (fishing, commercial and recreational); monitoring of bathing waters and pollution; urgent transportation of the injured; and fire-fighting.
The coast guard's field of operation typically extends well beyond the 12nm/22km of territorial waters and out into the open sea. As a consequence, it is frequently active right up to the territorial limits of other countries bordering the Mediterranean.
Capitanerie di Porto is a hybrid entity, and is in fact a military corps administered by the Italian Navy. It also has duties and jurisdiction in the civil field, monitored by the Ministero delle Infrastrutture e dei Trasporti (Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport). On the top of the command chain is the Comando Generale delle Capitanerie di Porto (CP HQ) in Rome, also functioning as Italian Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (IMRCC), which oversees a number of maritime directorates (Direzioni Marittime), which act as Italian Maritime Rescue Sub Centre (IMRSC). These departements have a total of 16 operational sites located along the entire coastline, running from Genoa to Trieste, including the islands of Sicily and Sardinia. Coast Guard units act as harbour commands and sit at the bottom of the hierarchy, along with maritime traffic regional offices and and beach delegations. These units coordinate sea operations and employ vehicles, aircraft and ships.
The Corps' flying units fall under the Servizio Aereo della Guardia Costiera (Coast Guard Air Service). There are three Air Stations with five Air Sections:
Luni-Sarzana:
* 1° Nucleo Aereo - Maintenance of electronic equipments
* 1^ Sezione Elicotteri - Flying two AB-412CPs and two Agusta-Westland AW.139CPs
Catania-Fontanarossa:
* 2° Nucleo Aereo - Flying three P-166DL3-SEM 2, one ATR-42MP and one Piaggio P-180CP
* 2^ Sezione Elicotteri - Flying two AB-412CPs and two Agusta-Westland AW.139CPs
Pescara-Fontanelle:
* 3° Nucleo Aereo - Flying two ATR-42s.

                   

TRAINING
Future pilots begin training at the Naval Academy in Rome and continue in the US, at Naval Air Station (NAS) Whiting Field, Florida, for basic instruction on the US Navy Beechcraft T-34C, which is being replaced by the T-6B Texan II. After this initial period, fixed-wing cadets continue their training at NAS Corpus Christi, Texas, flying the Beechcraft T-44A/C Pegasus, and getting the Naval Aviator Wings. Helicopter pilots instead return to Italy and achieve their Military Helicopter Wings at Frosinone, flying the Nardi-Hughes NH-500Es of the Italian Air Force 72° Stormo(72nd Wing).
Next step in the training is the conversion course on the aircraft that pilots will fly on operations.
Rotary-wing pilots go to CASEV (Centro Addestramento e Standardizzazione Equipaggi di Volo - Flight Crew Training and Standardization Centre) at Luni for theoretical and practical courses on the AW-139 or AB-412, depending the machine they will fly. The simulator phase for emergencies and VFR flight is completed at the AgustaWestland facility in Vergiate. This training phase lasts between eight and twelve months, at the end of which pilots are declared 'Pronto Impiego Limitato' (Limited Operational Ready), a qualification equivalent to co-pilot. After two to three years of flight experience, pilots are considered competent to work independently, and therefore become 'Pronto Impiego' (Operational Ready).
Back from the States, fixed-wing pilots continue their training in Pescara at the NAAF (Nucleo Addestramento Ala Fissa - Fixed Wing Training Units). After about 4 weeks of theoretical training, ATR pilots are going to Toulouse, France, where they fly some sixty hours with the simulator for the basic training course. On returning to Pescara, after a couple of familiarization flights and after some 25 operational/training missions, the pilots are declared 'First Officer'. They too have to spend about three years of flying missions before becoming 'Captain', and then have full responsibility of the aircraft.
P-166 pilots follow basic and conversion courses for the type at Catania (the only unit operating this machine), while P-180 pilots are directly trained by the Genoa based Piaggio Aero because don't need specific operational training for onboard electronic devices, as this aircraft, at the moment, has been used only for liaison tasks and transport.
However, the Coast Guard is in the process of upgrading the aircraft with equipment suitable for patrolling and, funds permitting, it is expected the acquisition of further three to five aircraft.
CASEV and NAAF, for rotary- and fixed wing-respectively, are tasked with the theoretical and operational training for pilots, coast guard crews, specialists and systems operators. They are also responsible for the periodical qualification checks for all personnel. But training never ends, as every six months pilots must attend simulator emergencies training at the manufacturer's plants and refresher courses on the use of special sensors.
FIXED WINGS MISSIONS
Although fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft sometimes can work together in a complementary way, they have obviously different operational tasks: long patrols to cover a broad area of water for the former, shorter range missions, with a specific target and very often in support of emergency calls, for the latter.
The ATR-42 is equipped with a range in excess than six hours. Thanks to the generous size, it can accommodate a minimum of three pilots, two at the controls and the third one that acts as TACCO (Tactical Operator), two systems operators sitting in front of the consoles of the ATOS, and three crew members as bubble side windows observers and, if necessary, in charge of launching smoke detectors and life rafts. True heart of the electronic systems, the ATOS (Airborne Tactical Observation and Surveilance) was designed by Selex Galileo for seamless integration of data received from various sensors, among all the ventral synthetic aperture Raytheon SeaVue 2022 radar, the revolving EOST turret (Electro Optical Sensor Turret) placed in correspondence of the right main landing gear, and the SLAR (Side Looking Airborne Radar) antennas positioned on both sides of the rear fuselage. All collected data are processed and displayed in real time on the operators suite, and can be sent on demand to the autopilot to plot the best route based on the information collected.
The operational capabilities of the ATR-42MP is such that in one mission it can complete the mapping of the Adriatic basin, from the Venetian lagoon to the southern tip of Puglia.
The other fixed-wing aircraft, the P-166-DL3 SEM (Sorveglianza Ecologica Marittima / Maritime Ecological Surveillance), entered in service in the late 80's in 14 examples, receiving the Service nickname 'Orca' (Killer Whale). They were equipped with state of the art (for that time) detection and search equipment. Nowadays only three aircraft remain in service. Over the years these aircraft have been subjected to an intensive use being the only Coast Guard aircraft capable of adequate range (3 hours and 30 minutes).
The Piaggios are equipped with GPS, a Daedalus DS 1268 multispectral remote sensor with twelve channels for the detection of pollutants in the sea. Search equipment are the night searchlight of 30 million candles, the panoramic 360° FIAR Bendix RDR-1500 radar and the under wing rotating turret containing a FLIR apparatus capable of discriminating thermal gradients in excess of 0.3°C, therefore suitable to detect human bodies in the water. The P-166s fly normally with four crew members, two pilots and two systems operators, also tasked with the emergency raft airdrop during SAR operations. Very often, these aircraft are being redeployed to Lampedusa Island, where they can patrol large areas of sea to the coasts of Tunisia and Libya.
ROTARY WINGS MISSIONS
Rotary wing aircraft are essential for effective air rescue at sea. Due to their flexibility and specific flight characteristics, helicopters are primarily tasked with supporting SAR missions. In addition, they support the activities of maritime police, including supervision and control of fisheries, surveillance of protected marine areas or special environmental or archaeological zones, fire fighting, civil protection and casualties transportation.
The first helicopter to enter service with the Italian Coast Guard was the AB-412, nicknamed 'Koala'. The acquisition of 24 aircraft was initially planned, to be distributed across air stations along the entire coastline. However only eight machines were purchased due to lack of resources: the first four were in the SP version, and the other four in the HP version, all delivered between July 1992 and October 1998. Two more of the latter were added, one in November 2002 and February 2003 while one helicopter was lost in 2001.
All the helicopters are now updated to AB-412CP standard, and the nine still in service form the backbone of the coast guard's rotary-wing fleet. Although they are now relatively outdated in terms of design philosophy and avionics equipment, the AB-412s are still young in terms of hours flown and reliable, albeit expensive to maintein. These machines are equipped with AN/SPS 71-7V2 Doppler radar, which calculates and compares in real time the position of the helicopter with a GPS card, interfaced to a search radar and to a FLIR/LLLTV (Forward-Looking Infra-Red/Low-Light-Level TeleVision) sensor that allows the viewing of objects, even in almost total darkness.
Plans to replace the AB-412CPs with the latest AW-139CPs, have been shelved again due to budget cuts caused by the current economic climate in Italy. Instead the existing fleet will receive upgrades to electronic and avionic equipment.
The other helicopter supplied to the coast guard is the more modern and efficient AW-139GC, known by the nickname 'Nemo'. The first of four machines entered service in July 2010 at Luni-Sarzana Air Station, and subsequently re-equipped the Catania unit. The last of these helicoters was delivered in February 2011. The initial plan was to replace the Koala fleet through the acquisition of 12 aircraft, but a lack of funds has made it impossible to complete the programme.
The qualitative leap obtained with the AW-139 has been remarkable thanks to its operational characteristics and performances. The generous size of the cabin and the surplus of available power provided by the two Pratt &Whitney PT6C-67 turboshaft engines, rated at 1,530shp, make the AW-139 a top performer in its class. The interior is spacious and there is a sufficient room for the rescue team and equipment. The advanced design of the five-blades rotor allows for a stable, fast and comfortable flight, with very low vibrations that are noticeable only during hovering. From an operational point of view, the Nemo can fly around a three-hour mission (the option of an internal auxiliary fuel tank is not yet available). The AW.139CP can still carry out missions up to 140nm /260 km away, with 30 minutes of SAR activities on-site. The cruise speed is some 145kt/268 km/h, only a little lower than the P-166DL3/SEM at 162kt, while the maximum speed is 167kt/310 km/h. Compared with the Koala the only drawback is the lack of skids: the wheeled landing gear makes for less stability on soft terrains or when landing on ships in rough seas.
The AW-139CP avionics suite is sophisticated, comprehensive and fully digitised. Th four channel Digital Automatic Flight Control System (DAFCS) allows the crew to select various modes of automatic flight for SAR activities. Moreover, it is essential in the hover, even in extreme conditions, allowing the aircraft to hold a perfect fixed point, and is significantly more effective than the one mounted on the AB-412CP.
The mission equipment is comprehensive as well; the nose fairing houses an advanced FIAR Bendix 1500B-plus search radar; the nose a turret contains a Star Safire QVIP FLIR with a laser illuminator and pointer, plus two LLLTV cameras. An Automatic Identification System, a Direction Finder, and aeronautical and naval VHF radios completes the avionic devices. A NightSun searchlight is mounted on the lower-left forward fuselage, while a 272kg-capable hoist is mounted on the upper- right fuselage. The crew can use AN/AVS-9 cockpit-integrated NVGs.
Both helicopters are operated by two pilots and two operators, one of whom is a qualified air-rescue man.
Said about the current situation we can only spend few words about what may be the future programme: funds permitting Italian Coast Guard should get eight new AW-139s with which will be able to equip even the Capitanerie di Porto Air Station of Cagliari-Elmas (covering middle Tyrrenian Sea and Sardinia Channel), Pontecagnano southern Tyrrenian Sea), and Pescara (middle Adriatic Sea).

                   

The authors would like to thank CF Andrea VITALI and CF Pietro MELE for their assistance during the visits