The Philippine Coast Guard will join this year’s Marine Pollution Exercise (MARCOPLEX) in Indonesia this May, it said in a statement Saturday.

The Coast Guard will send the BRP Tubbataha, the first MRRV which was acquired by the Philippines through a soft loan from Japan, BRP Pampanga and tugboat Habagat with a total of 200 personnel.

The drill will be held in Bali from May 15 to 18.

A send-off ceremony, led by Commodore Joel Garcia at the PCG Ready Force Headquarters in Pier 13, South Harbor, will held in Monday morning.

The exercise will be participated by Indonesian and Japanese counterparts.

The Coast Guard said their vessels are expected to return to the country after the exercises.

The Coast Guard has two other MRRVs from Japan. These are BRP Malabrigo the second unit that was also commissioned to PCG service last year and BRP Malapascua the third unit formally commissioned last March.

These vessels that are named before Philippine lighthouses, were built by the Japan Marine United Corporation (JMUC) Yokohama Shipyard as part of the 10 units of 44-meter MRRV’s acquired by the Philippines under the Maritime Safety Capability Improvement Project of the transportation department.

This was an Official Development Assistance (ODA) project through a tied loan extended by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

The loan facility for the project covers P 7,373,700,000.00 out of the total project of P 8,807,700,000.00 while the balance of P 1,434,000,000.00 will be sourced from the Philippine counterpart.

The delivery of these vessels, with a standard cruising speed of 25 knots, and a range of 1,500 nautical miles, will be completed by 2018. Robina Asido/DMS