Deployed during a Pandemic

Home feels a long way away when you’re deployed overseas. Even more so when a pandemic has gripped the world and coming home even for a short holiday is out of the question. Air Force News chatted with some of our Attachés posted abroad to see how different their deployments look now.

New Zealand Defence Attaché to Japan and the Philippines Group Captain (GPCAPT) Nick McMillan said the first cases emerged in Japan just before the docking of the Diamond Princess cruise ship in early February. At that point there was still much unknown about the virus.

“We worked alongside the Australians to get the Kiwis off the ship and repatriated back to New Zealand.”

In April/May, the Japanese Government requested the voluntary closure of all restaurants, parks and most non-essential shops, but the country’s capital, Tokyo was not locked down like in other countries. GPCAPT McMillan said it was partly because Japanese people tend to be very law-abiding and they were also a mask-wearing society.

Because of those factors, transmission levels were “extremely low” in the beginning, he said. But after the State of Emergency was lifted in late May, Japan was hit by a second wave of infections in July/August.

“For the first few months we operated morning and afternoon shifts so we didn’t have too many people in the Embassy. We enforced mask-wearing, social distancing, and would have meetings via video conferencing as much as possible – even if we were having meetings with others in separate offices within the building.”

No Embassy staff member contracted the virus, GPCAPT McMillan said.

“We have staff who are responsible for and look after their elderly parents so we are very mindful of that.”

“The last six months have been surreal and has severely curtailed our ability to do some things. But we now have time to do some of the more strategic work that we might not have had time to do if everything was normal.”

Defence Attaché to Indonesia and Timor-Leste GPCAPT Pete Griffin said transmission cases in Indonesia had been exceedingly high with about 3,000 cases identified daily – a figure considered to be under-reported according to the World Health Organisation.

“Most ex-pats seem to be quite aware of the situation and they do all the right things, they wear masks, wash hands properly and keep their social distance as part of their routine. Masks are not unusual in a South East Asia environment anyway, so they were embraced pretty quickly,” he said.

“In the Embassy we’d gone into two teams from February. I come to work generally every second day, so I can feel productive and I’ve got my own office, so I don’t feel like I’m in close contact with people during the day, which is fine.”

The past six months had been “emotionally and mentally challenging” and the embassy team had to ensure they didn’t become too isolated, GPCAPT Griffin said.

“Over the past few weeks we’ve been taking other Defence Attachés out for a game of golf, just to get out and get together. It’s a reasonably safe environment for a few of us to get together. It’s the highlight of the week. It’s been a way to get some work done as well.”

London’s Air Attaché Wing Commander (WGCDR) Steve Thornley said they had started practicing working in two separate bubbles shortly before the Government gave the stay home directive.

“That was back in March and essentially that lasted for the better part of three months for us. Just this week schools went back, so there’s that little bit of normality coming back into the fray.

“We set up our meetings working from home and cracked on from there.”

Most of his colleagues now make their way to the High Commission, based on Haymarket in central London, by walking or cycling and avoiding public transport if they are required in the office.

“The first time I rode my pushbike in from Clapham I got passed by two busses and one car. It’s surreal – you could ride your bike down The Mall and you’d be the only person there. London’s not the London that people know.

“We live in the Borough of Lambeth, with a land area just a little bit bigger than [the Wellington suburb of] Karori and we’ve had nearly 300 deaths since March 25. I use that as a bit of a scale.”

Arriving with his partner, three-year-old daughter and two dogs just a few weeks before the pandemic hit meant that WGCDR Thornley hadn’t had a typical start to his deployment.

“It was fairly challenging because I didn’t get a chance to make those normal faceto-face contacts that you’d routinely make. I had essential ones like people within Air Staff and the Ministry of Defence, but it took a while to be able to branch out beyond that.

“The biggest challenge has been the uncertainty that the team has had to deal with and not knowing what the next steps will be. New Zealand is a long way away at the moment – you can’t just jump on an aeroplane and come home.” - Wing Commander Steve Thornley