PLA Daily 2007-02-25

　　Despite the severe cold weather outdoors on the morning of February 16, the officers and men of a patrol vessel group under the Shenyang Military Area Command organized an indoor confrontation exercise by using the simulated vessel comprehensive training system.

　　The patrol vessel group shouldered the border patrolling and duty-performing missions on the Heilong River. In the severe cold region, the river will be frozen when it comes to winter. As a result, all the vessels have to stay in port and the actual-vessel training is not possible for half a year. Thus, the group invested more than two million yuan to build a simulated vessel training center. The officers and men of the group can carry out simulated full-drainage-area and all-subject tactical training in the emulated water system.

　　When stepped on the "emulated driving platform" in the training center, the reporters can feel the real navigating state of the vessel in such complicated conditions as rainy days, foggy days and nights. According to the group leader Liu Liansheng, since the operation of this system, the group can carry out the simulated training for the recruits once they are assigned to the grassroots companies every year. And with this system, the training contents that required eight months to accomplish in the past can be finished now within four months only, so that the recruits can participate in the patrolling and duty-performing missions in the same year they join in the army.

　　By Wang Bing and Zhou Jun