Airborne……All
the Way!
I already
detailed my civilian skydiving violations so I will now take a stab at the
military parachuting portions.
I was not airborne qualified when I volunteered for SF
training so I had to stop at Ft. Benning prior to heading for John Wayne
University at Camp Mackall, NC. You have to be at least a sergeant to go to the
Q course and I was a fresh E-5 sergeant when I showed up at jump school. This
led to my appointment as student platoon sergeant responsible to our particular
Black Hat instructor, who having a complete lack of rhythm was overjoyed to know
that I could call cadence and march the platoon around smartly so he wouldn’t
have to. Because I was going through
the course in June we had a ton of ROTC college cadets, which gets interesting
as they are not really soldiers yet. They could march in formation though which
was a start. We began training and learned about the 5 points of contact for
completing a proper parachute landing fall (PLF) which are the parts of your
body that should hit the ground in order. They are, balls of the feet, calves,
thighs, buttocks and the push up muscle. This explains repeated admonitions for
us to “Remove your heads from your fourth point of contact”. All in all airborne training is almost identical to
the WWII era. We ran, we did pushups, we did pull ups, we jumped from 34 foot
mock aircraft and slid down a cable pretending we were under canopy and we did
several million PLFs. Apparently the simple act of hitting the ground with bent
knees and falling on your side is nearly impossible to do correctly. We did them
first thing in the morning, we did them standing in line for chow, we did them
before bed. Eventually we must have improved slightly because they decided to
let us put on parachutes and load up on an aircraft, in this case a C-141 which
holds about 130 wannabe paratroopers. We rigged up at the airfield and began the age old
ritual of hurry up and wait as we sat for hours for absolutely no reason I could
see. But eventually the aircraft arrived and the Black Hats were screaming,
although a C-141 has four huge jet engines so we couldn’t hear them and they
screamed all the time anyway. We trooped up the ramp and as student platoon
sergeant I had the privilege of being the first one to put my knees in the
breeze on our first jump, so I was last on. The primary jumpmaster was a
particularly obnoxious 6’6” mutant Black Hat with a big Mickey Mouse tattoo
on his left bicep and he gave me an evil grin as I passed him. The ride to
altitude was quick and we passed it running through all the procedures for
malfunctions and imagining what it would be like to auger in if nothing opens
above your head. We then got our first of the jump commands and the
accompanying hand and arm signals. “Twenty Minutes!” Mutant Mickey bellowed flashing
his ten extended digits twice. We noted this but took no action. MM returned again
with “Six Minutes” and this begins the active steps toward hopping out the
door. “Get Ready!” A double “talk to the hand”.
This is time to take one last check of all the things that will hopefully save
your ass when you jump and aggregate your fecal matter overall. “Outboard Personnel Stand Up” Double two-finger
Boy Scout salute raised from sides to overhead. Obvious action. “Inboard Personnel Stand Up!” Obvious “Hook Up!” Double Fists with index crooked like a C
pumped twice. Attach Snap Hook to cable and lock shut. Jerk it to make sure it
is locked. “Check Equipment!” Double Fingers extended and joined
tap chest and extend to sides twice. This involves checking all your connections
and then tracing the static line on the back of the person in front of you to
make sure it is OK. “Sound Off For Equipment Check!” Double hands cupped
behind ears. Starting from the rear of the bird. Each slaps the ass of the
person in front yelling “OK!” all the way to the front where I was and I
look at MM and step forward yelling at the top of my lungs “ALL OK
JUMPMASTER!”. MM gave me a devilish grin and got back to his duties which
consist of taking control of the jump door from the Air Force Loadmaster and
inspecting it to ensure it was safe to jump. This is a very intense process and
MM got to it, examining the jump platform that extends 18 inches outside the
aircraft. This locks down once the door is opened and ensures jumpers clear the
side of the aircraft on exit. He stomps his foot down on it and when it held, he
grabbed the edges of both sides of the door and then put both feet on the
platform and arched his body outside the aircraft until he was fully in the
slipstream with only his hands still inside the bird. This blew my mind as I had
never seen it done before and if his hands had slipped he was gone. Although it just sounds mad there is method. While flappin’
in the breeze MM is visually inspecting the outside of the aircraft to ensure
there are no protrusions that could snag a static line resulting in a towed
jumper. He is also ensuring there are no other aircraft in the vicinity and
finally he is visually acquiring the Drop Zone DZ and looking for the landmarks
that tell him how long to the DZ. He popped back inside with a big old grin and
proclaimed. “One Minute!” and then he looks at me, points to the door and
says “Stand In The Door!” I then shuffle over to the door, hand my static
line to the Safety and step one foot out onto the jump platform and place both
hands on the outside of the aircraft. At this point I can feel the 130 mph wind
whipping at my leg and right in front of my eyes is an open door in the side of
an aircraft and 1250 ft. below the Georgia scenery is whipping by. This is a
very WTF moment and it was a long and amazing minute but eventually we were over
the release point and I saw the green light come on and heard the second to last
thing before I was airborne “GO!” At this point I should spring forth off both feet and
assume the correct body position to safely pass through the jet wash and survive
the opening shock. What actually happened was that MM revealed just what had
been tickling him as he gave me a size 14 boot directly to the ass so instead of
gracefully flinging myself in perfect aerodynamic form out into the wind I
launched flailing like a man falling off a building. The last thing I heard
behind me was MM laughing his ass off. Static Line parachuting is almost foolproof so even my
horrible body position had no effect and the chute jerked open wicked fast. It
felt like a decent car crash but it stopped and lo and behold above my head a
fully inflated canopy. WOO HOO! It is all well and good to know that these
things work 99.999% of the time but that all BS until you see it up where it
belongs and you realize you will not hit the earth like a giant lawn dart. You
don’t spend a lot of time under canopy so I was busy figuring the wind
direction and pulling risers to turn into the wind. You can’t fly a round
parachute but you can rotate it and you definitely want to be facing into the
wind because land with it and it will smash you flat. I got turned and saw the ground rushing up and got into
position for a textbook PLF, which I executed and then stood up and enjoyed 10
seconds of pure exhilaration before a Black Hat was screaming at us to police up
or parachutes and double time off the DZ. One jump down, four to go for the
wings. The next two jumps were fairly uneventful and we progressed
to the fourth which was the first time we jumped with combat equipment. The
first three were “Hollywood” with just a main and reserve parachute, while
now we would hang a full rucksack in front of our legs. This adds to the
difficulty and requires you to release the rucksack on a lowering line so you
don’t land with it. We were all focused on this new twist as we loaded up and
headed to altitude. We were the second stick to go and the first left safely so
we were stood up, hooked up, and shuffled to the door. The first sign I got that
something was wrong was when the AF Loadmaster stood up and pushed past the
Jumpmaster to look out the door. When he popped his head back in his eyes were big as dinner
plates and he started yelling at the other crew and they were yanking open
bulkheads and grabbing tools. I had just a second to lean toward the door and it
was instantly obvious what the problem was as there was hydraulic fluid
streaming off the entire wing. By now the Load had a 5 gal. can of hydraulic
fluid open and was pouring it in a reservoir behind a panel in the skin. The
problem was the level was dropping faster than he could pour it. They moved us
back toward the front of the aircraft while they figured out what to do. After a
bit the word came that they could turn the plane by goosing the engines so they
were going to put the rest of us out in one big pass instead of the six it
should have taken and then fly to a nearby air base and land without us. They got us all lined up and ready to go and yelled at us
to hustle out the door as we didn’t have enough drop zone to fit everyone. The
green light came on and we all barrel-assed out the doors with the Black Hats
pushing from the back like Japanese subway packers. Everyone was out and the sky
was full of parachutes and amazingly we only had 3 or 4 out of 60 some land in
the trees and we had no major injuries. The fifth jump was gravy after that and my taking over his
marching duties led my Black hat to get me the Honor Graduate award so I got my
wings pinned on by a General and a cool statue that raised me up in Willy,
Sammy’s Dad’s eyes as 30 years earlier he got the same award.