Civil Air Patrol Members Train In Tulsa

NewsOn6.com

More than two dozen volunteers from across the state are learning the skills they'll need when disaster strikes.

Members of Oklahoma's Civil Air Patrol met at Jones Riverside Airport to go over some of the basics. 

Today they learned about flying search missions -- looking for missing people and lost aircraft as well as aerial surveillance of natural disasters.

But, that's a far cry from what the Civil Air Patrol was in the early days of World War Two.

"A week before the Pearl Harbor Attacks, the Civil Air Patrol was kind of established and as a system to watch the coast lines for enemy submarines," said Lieutenant Carder Ehlert of the Civil Air Patrol. "During World War II, we were credited with sinking two enemy subs."

The Civil Air Patrol is based out of Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma City, but has squadrons across the state so they can respond to any disaster at a moment's notice.