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Navy engineers to survey Fuga Island for base construction

By Priam Nepomuceno

August 14, 2020, 3:59 pm

<p>Philippine Navy chief, Vice Admiral Giovanni Carlo Bacordo. <em>(File photo)</em></p>

Philippine Navy chief, Vice Admiral Giovanni Carlo Bacordo. (File photo)

MANILA – The Philippine Navy (PN) on Friday said it will soon deploy engineers to Fuga Island in Cagayan province to determine the best location for the building of a proposed naval detachment and other facilities.

"We are going to send Navy engineers there to survey the area where is the best location for the naval detachment and also for them to get the detailed architectural and engineering plans," said Navy chief, Vice Admiral Giovanni Carlo Bacordo, in an interview with reporters.

Bacordo earlier said President Rodrigo R. Duterte has instructed that some 20 hectares in the area be given to the PN for the construction of a naval detachment.

The Northern Luzon Command on August 8 thru the Naval Forces Northern Luzon established a Marine detachment in the area to constitute and execute the plans of the Armed Forces of the Philippines to build defense facilities on the island, which will include a sheltered pier, a naval station, and a littoral monitoring station.

"So Navy engineers will be going to Fuga Island physically to survey (on where) the littoral monitoring station will be put. It should be ideally (placed at the) highest point of the island," he added.

Bacordo said a littoral monitoring station is a physical structure equipped with radars, radio equipment and electro-optical devices so that all ships in the area are monitored and manned round-the-clock by PN personnel.

"(The) radar and the electro-optical equipment can monitor ships as far as 24 miles out, the higher your location, the better, you go even further, so you can monitor all ships and even communicate with these ships," he added.

Meanwhile, the naval detachment, Bacordo said, should be near the sea and in a protected location so that it will not be exposed to the elements. (PNA)

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