The fourth edition of the Personnel Recovery Controller and Planner Course (PRCPC), a project initiated by the European Defence Agency, took place from 25 May to 5 June 2015 in Veszprém, Hungary. Organised and hosted by the Hungarian Defence Forces at the Air Command and Control Centre (ACCC), the exercise gathered 20 students from 8 countries.
Students from Austria, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom benefitted from the knowledge and experience of a cadre of instructors from Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Sweden, Canada, and the United States. Personnel recovery (PR) is usually defined as the sum of military, diplomatic and civil efforts needed to ensure the recovery and reintegration of isolated civilian or military personnel.
During the course, the newly-developed EDA’s Personnel Recovery Functional Area Service Advanced Technology Demonstrator (PR FAS ATD) was successfully tested and evaluated. This system is designed to provide headquarters-level PR staff with a planning tool to manage PR missions. It has been developed as part of EDA’s work to improve interoperability amongst European armed forces in the field of personnel recovery.
The next EU PRCPC will take place from 23 November to 4 December 2015 in Italy (Poggio, Renatico) and will be organised by the European Personnel Recovery Centre (EPRC). During the course, the final test of the PR FAS ATD will take place and should then allow the system to be available to all EDA participating Member States.
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The EDA PRCPC project was established on 30 May 2013 as an EDA Category B project, under the lead of Sweden. As of today, it gathers six contributing EU Member States (cMS): Austria, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands and Sweden. On 31st May 2015 the cMS agreed to extend the PRCPC Cat B project until 30 May 2017. EPRC is a potential candidate for the continuation of the project.