 This is the eighth year of Phoenix Express. Multinational naval leaders have arrived in Sudabeg, Greece for the Phoenix Express 2014 presale conference. The conference is one of the final steps before the at sea portion of the exercise. Well, Phoenix Express is a multinational exercise designed to improve maritime security and stability in the Mediterranean region. This year we have 10 nations participating, four from North Africa, five from Southern Europe, as well as the United States. And throughout the exercise, we're going to concentrate on interoperability, working with our other nations' navies. Phoenix Express allows participating nations to work side by side to better synchronize responses to potential real world scenarios. The value is that we are creating common standards and procedures that facilitate interoperability among units. In that way, we can work collectively. We can execute operations collectively following the same procedures and speaking the same language. The purpose of the exercise is to increase maritime security in order to protect and improve international trade. Well, frankly, events like Phoenix Express, it makes the Mediterranean safer. As we know in the global world and our global economy that we're all a part of, 90% of all international trade by volume travels over the sea. So what happens on the sea is important not only to all of our jobs, but all of our economies. The at sea portion of the exercise is slated to run from May 24th to June 2nd. Petty Officer Andrew Brame, Suda Bay, Crete.