Ground and air rescue teams trained together for two days in the mountains around Lioni and Caposele, in the province of Avellino, in a joint exercise focused on searching for missing people and helicopter rescue techniques.
The exercise took place on 24 and 25 September 2026 in mountainous areas of the two municipalities. According to local reports, it brought together Alpine Rescue units of the Guardia di Finanza and technicians from CNSAS Campania, with both ground teams and aviation units involved.
Participants included Guardia di Finanza Alpine Rescue units from Sant'Angelo dei Lombardi, Roccaraso, Nicolosi and Cosenza, working alongside CNSAS Campania technicians. An AW139 helicopter operated by the Guardia di Finanza Air Section in Naples took part in the air component of the training.
What the exercise tested
The training scenarios centred on the search for a missing person in steep and difficult terrain, a situation typical of emergencies in mountainous and isolated areas.
The programme also included helicopter rescue and winch manoeuvres on rock faces using the Guardia di Finanza AW139. The reports describe complex winch operations from the helicopter, carried out together with ground personnel.
The sources describe the event as simulated training. They do not report a real rescue, injuries or arrests connected with the two days, and they do not give exact mountain sectors, a daily timetable or the number of personnel involved.
Why the two organisations train together
The stated purpose of the exercise was to improve interoperability and standardise operational procedures for emergencies in mountainous and isolated areas.
In practice, that means ensuring that Guardia di Finanza rescue units and CNSAS teams can work side by side during the same operation, from the ground search phase to the helicopter phase, using shared procedures.
The exercise involved organisations operating within a broader national mountain-rescue system whose activities include rescue operations, technical training and cooperation with public emergency structures. CNSAS describes itself as the national mountain and speleological rescue body, and its official news site presents training and operational cooperation as part of its institutional activity.
That wider context helps explain the scale of joint preparation. CNSAS reports more than 13,000 rescue missions in 2025 on its official news site, an indication of how regularly mountain-rescue organisations are called to intervene across Italy.
No dedicated official Guardia di Finanza or CNSAS press release for this specific exercise is identified in the available reports. The account is based on local press coverage of the Lioni and Caposele training, corroborated by a second report, with institutional background from CNSAS.
