Aomori Province on the northern part of Honshu, the main island of Japan, has a reputation for great apples and cold weather. The apples are sweet and crisp. The weather can be downright unpleasant, even in early March. The wind blows hard and relentlessly. Snow falls on cloudless days.
Hachinohe, Aomori’s largest city on the Pacific coast, is the northernmost home to twenty of Japan’s P-3C Orions. What used to be Hachinohe’s airport is now a dedicated air base for VP-2 and VP-4, the two squadrons assigned to Air Wing 2.
The entire Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, or JMSDF, operates a fleet of approximately 100 P-3Cs in ten squadrons (eight operational, one training, and one test squadron). Most of these aircraft were built in Japan by Kawasaki Heavy Industries beginning in the early 1980s. The last Orion built in the world was delivered from Kawasaki to the JMSDF in early 2000.
Orion crews dedicate most of their missions to patrolling and protecting Japan’s territorial waters and vital sea lanes. And with good reason. Ninety percent of Japan’s trade comes by way of ocean-going vessels through these waters.
P-3C crews from Hachinohe cover the northern region of Japan, including the area around Hokkaido, Japan’s northern island. The northern stretches of the Sea of Japan and the Sea of Okhotsk are high-traffic areas for Russian ships and the occasional boat from North Korea. UH-60J helicopters from Hachinohe, which support these missions, are used for civilian and military rescue operations and firefighting.
From late December to early March, P-3C crews from Hachinohe perform a mission unique to the JMSDF. They map drifting ice floes in the Sea of Okhotsk from the Siberian coast to the northern coastline of Hokkaido, about 1,000 miles south. The Hokkaido coast, located on roughly the same latitude as Portland, Oregon, is the southernmost region in the northern hemisphere for drifting sea ice.
“We not only track the ice floe,” explains Leading Seaman Shotaro Miyagawa of the Meteorological Section at Hachinohe AB, “but we also record its quality — that is, its thickness and shape.” The information goes to Japan’s meteorological service, which makes it available to the commercial shipping and fishing industries. “Someone from the meteorological service with a visual knowledge of ice always flies with the crew.”
Though not as dangerous as icebergs, drift ice can catch unlucky vessels by surprise. Years ago, ice posed a real danger for ships and their crews, sometimes trapping them months at a time. Modern ice-breaking ships have done away with that threat. Today, drift ice has become a regional tourist attraction.
The JMSDF celebrated its 1,000th ice-chasing mission in February 2006. The task, begun in 1960 as an assignment for Lockheed P-2 Neptunes, is becoming less frequent. Most ice is now tracked by analyzing satellite photos. The JMSDF expects to fly only a dozen ice-chasing missions in 2006, compared to thirty-six flights in 2005.
“We expect the mission to continue for the near future,” explains Miyagawa. “Our crews can still see things that can’t be detected in satellite photos. Everyone enjoys the missions, as they are a change from the normal routine. Besides, the ice floes themselves are a spectacular sight.”
Eric Hehs is the editor of Code One.
