Nato’s river crossing experts teamed up to take on Europe’s busiest commercial waterway in a large-scale test of operational capability.
The German-British Amphibious Engineer Battalion 130 – which includes a squadron of sappers – spanned the River Rhine using their M3 Rigs, platforms that can be joined together into a bridge or used as ferries to transport heavy military equipment.
Exercise Grand Crossing also involved Italian and Dutch counterparts, bringing the total number of troops to 1,200.
Starting in Sennelager, they completed a 130-mile road move to Rees, replicating the logistical demands of vehicle convoys, refuelling and inter-army coordination.
Maj Ryan Ingram (RE), OC of the UK’s 23 Amphibious Engineer Squadron, said it was an opportunity for his soldiers to work with different nations, learn from their experience and “effectively be better together”.
