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RQ-4 Global Hawks arrive at Yokota Air Base

374th Airlift Wing Public Affairs

May 22, 2021 | 0:47

U.S. Pacific Air Forces will rotate RQ-4 Global Hawks from the 4th Reconnaissance Squadron, 319th Operation Group, Andersen Air Force Base, Guam to Yokota Air Base, Japan, May 22, 2021.

The rotational deployment of the Global Hawk to Japan is necessary to ensure Airmen can continuously operate the platform during months in which inclement weather in Guam has the potential to hinder theater-wide operations through the summer to fall season. This move ensures persistent reconnaissance in a region where challenges to a free and open Indo-Pacific continue to increase.

The Global Hawk serves as a high-altitude, long-endurance, remotely piloted and unarmed, aerial reconnaissance system. The aircraft is designated to provide persistent, day and night, high resolution, all weather imagery of large geographic areas with an array of integrated sensors and cameras.

The Airmen from the unit will adhere to all COVID-19 non-pharmaceutical intervention practices put in place by the Government of Japan and the Department of Defense.

The Global Hawk also supports humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations like Operation Tomodachi, when the Department of Defense mobilized 24,000 service members to assist Japan with disaster relief after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake hit the northeastern Honshu coast March 11, 2011.