SINGAPORE - Overseas training for trainees at the Singapore Armed Forces' Officer Cadet School (OCS) has been cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Officer cadets now also have to keep to their own platoon - which has 40 people or less including instructors - for their training as part of safe distancing measures.

Designated routes to blocks where cadets stay have been fixed, to avoid having different platoons interact at the Safti Military Institute in Joo Koon.

Cadets also have their meals in their two-men rooms, as common areas such as pantries in the accommodation blocks and the cookhouse are closed.

They have to wear a mask at all times within the school when not doing strenuous activities, while activities deemed non-essential such as close combat training and family visits have been deferred or cancelled.

These are among the changes that OCS, which currently trains more than 750 cadets to become military officers via a 38-week course, has adapted to deal with the Covid-19 outbreak.

Other changes include having home-based learning for certain theory lessons and halving the number of soldiers on buses and military trucks when they are transported to and from training areas.

Training continues at SAF training schools like OCS and the Specialist Cadet School during the circuit breaker period that started on April 7, even as basic military training has been suspended and in-camp training for operationally ready national servicemen is deferred.

Colonel Edwin Goh, the OCS commander, on Monday (May 11) said the school has to continue generating officers for active and operational units as the SAF continues to defend Singapore amid the pandemic. The SAF constantly needs to groom new officers to replace those who have completed their full-time service.

Reporters on Monday (May 11) observed how the 78 cadets from Alpha Wing - who are part of the next batch of trainees slated to commission as officers in June - carried out their training. Their commissioning parade, where loved ones are usually invited, will also be modified to become a smaller-scale ceremony with no guests.

Asked why OCS could not do just home-based learning, which is the arrangement for recruits from the Basic Military Training Centre (BMTC), Col Goh, 46, said there are aspects of officer cadet training that home-based learning cannot cover.

"Officer cadets are at a more advanced stage of training, unlike the BMTC where the SAF has decided they can suspend training for a while and make up for it subsequently," he said, adding that some of these aspects include leadership and team dynamics, as well as resilience training.

On the cancellation of overseas exercises, he said such training is very important as it offers a different environment, atmosphere and terrain that "trains the cadets' resilience and adaptiveness".

Overseas training like jungle survival has been redesigned so that it is done in Singapore.

The cadets at Alpha Wing, who had completed their jungle confidence course in Brunei before the circuit breaker period but missed out on their second overseas exercise last month, had trained in Pulau Tekong for a week instead.

Col Goh said that while local training may not fully replicate what can be achieved overseas, cadets can still pick up the required skill sets and knowledge so training standards are not compromised.

He added that separating cadets into "functional groups" such as platoons was to ensure there was no opportunity for cross-transmission. "The key thing here is to ensure that every functional group has their own training area and time, so if you cannot cohort them by area, then we would stagger them by timing to ensure they do not mix."

Measures have been implemented in OCS to step up personal hygiene as well.

Personal equipment such as water bottles must not be shared, and hand-washing before meals are enforced. Cadets also march from point to point in a formation that is more spread out than usual.

On Monday, reporters saw how Alpha Wing cadets wore masks when doing their drills as they moved out from a helicopter mock-up as preparation for a key full-day exercise on Tuesday (May 12).

Alpha Wing assistant platoon commander, Lieutenant Mohamed Haiqal Mohamed Zainal, 24, said the precautionary measures taken are to ensure the cadets' safety.

"It's our responsibility (as instructors) to enforce that everyone down the line abide by these measures, and they have to understand why. We can't afford to have clusters formed in OCS, because we have to continue training.

"If a cluster is found in OCS, it will affect their training, morale, as well as their well-being as a whole," he said.

Officer Cadet Songkiat Ow Shiyuan, who is from Alpha Wing, said that he was disappointed that overseas exercises were cancelled, as it was one of the highlights of OCS training.

But he felt standards of overseas training can still be replicated in Singapore. On the exercise in Pulau Tekong, the 22-year-old said: "The intensity was really great. There was back-to-back missions, and we didn't have much sleep - this was all to train our resilience and whatever we have learnt as officer cadets."