On Friday, 22 January, in Herat, the handover ceremony with Lt Col Amadori. In almost three months of activity, the ‘Black Cats’ Task Group successfully completed numerous operational missions throughout Afghan territory, carrying out over 350 flight hours in about 140 sorties divided between Close Air Support and tactical support for ground troops, as well as aerial reconnaissance activities to support Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) needs, through which almost 200 photographic reconnaissance targets were analysed.
The personnel of Task Group ‘Black Cats’, deployed in Afghanistan as part of the Joint Air Task Force, come from the Italian Air Force Flying Groups that employ the AM-X aircraft: the 132nd and 103rd Groups of the 51st Wing of Istrana and the 13th and 101st Groups of the 32nd Wing of Amendola. The 4 AM-X aircraft operate in synergy with Predator unmanned aircraft and are equipped with a state-of-the-art reconnaissance system which, thanks to high-performance electro-optical and infrared digital sensors, allows the aircraft to conduct reconnaissance of ground targets from medium and high altitudes, day and night.
