You'd think that after the first jump the worries about parachuting would have disappeared but it didn't work that way. For some reason the fear grew greater before each and every jump that I made. Perhaps it was the length of the long drawn out process that involved getting up in the early hours before dawn, the wait to get the parachute, the bus ride to the base and the wait to get on the plane followed by the flight and then the shuffle towards the door. All of it together served to cut up my nerves till they were red raw and serve them back up to me. I hated it, all of which served only to make the descent on the parachute that much more enjoyable. The float through the air and the knowledge that I had fought against my fears and overcome them made the trip down a gift I could enjoy from start to finish.
At the start of the course they had told us that each jump would be harder than the one before and that was true. The first jump had been without any equipment, the second had been with a bag containing all of my infantry equipment including my rifle. That bag sits in between the paratrooper's legs until after the jump, once the parachute has deployed there is a lever on the parachute rig that trooper pulls enabling the bag to drop down three meters. The bag is attached to the parachute harness by three meters of cable ensuring that it simply dangles there and actually serves as a marker for the paratrooper to know when he should brace himself for impact with the ground. Once on the ground he takes his gear out of the bag and is ready for war.
For my second jump I shuffled up to the door of the Hercules aircraft complete with bag between my legs and rather than waiting for me to jump of my own accord the jump instructor pushed me. Out I went screaming "21,22,23" and when I opened my eyes I found once again that the canopy had deployed, unfortunately something had gone wrong. One of the parachute cords had somehow twisted around my leg and I was suspended upside down. This realisation provoked a long moment of panic during which I started screaming at the parachute to "Give my leg back!" There was some fighting during which I pulled on my leg and reached up with my arms to try and get a grip on the offending cable long enough to release my foot. All the time this is happening I had this big bag of equipment pressing down into my nether regions and I was screaming at the parachute rig for being a complete asshole!
After a superhuman feat of exertion I managed to free my leg and immediately fall the right way up. Now all I had to do was pull the lever below my reserve chute and allow the equipment bag to drop down the three meters until the cable connecting it to the parachute rig went taught. This was precisely what my brain ordered my hand to do but my hand had an opinion all of its own. "Are you sure that this lever does actually drop the bag down three meters?" it asked back to my brain, "Yes I am, pull the lever" my brain responded, but still my hand wasn't so sure, "Are you sure that this isn't a special release lever for the whole rig and that pulling it won't simply see us fall out of the harness and to our deaths below?" "Ermmm, yes I am sure, pull the lever" the brain replied,"well you kinda hesitated for a moment there brain, are you sure there's nothing else you want to tell me?" The argument between arm and brain continued for a couple of moments until I pulled the lever and felt the reassuring drop of the bag from between my legs and the somewhat less reassuring tug on the rig as the cable went taught with the thing dangling beneath me.
I then hit the ground, rolled, released the chute and jumped up ready to fight another day.
The next jump was a night jump and the jump after that another day jump, the fifth jump was cancelled due to bad weather. Apparently four jumps was enough to qualify from the course and I had my silver wings and a ticket back to an evil pile of mud in the North of the West Bank.
At the start of the course they had told us that each jump would be harder than the one before and that was true. The first jump had been without any equipment, the second had been with a bag containing all of my infantry equipment including my rifle. That bag sits in between the paratrooper's legs until after the jump, once the parachute has deployed there is a lever on the parachute rig that trooper pulls enabling the bag to drop down three meters. The bag is attached to the parachute harness by three meters of cable ensuring that it simply dangles there and actually serves as a marker for the paratrooper to know when he should brace himself for impact with the ground. Once on the ground he takes his gear out of the bag and is ready for war.
For my second jump I shuffled up to the door of the Hercules aircraft complete with bag between my legs and rather than waiting for me to jump of my own accord the jump instructor pushed me. Out I went screaming "21,22,23" and when I opened my eyes I found once again that the canopy had deployed, unfortunately something had gone wrong. One of the parachute cords had somehow twisted around my leg and I was suspended upside down. This realisation provoked a long moment of panic during which I started screaming at the parachute to "Give my leg back!" There was some fighting during which I pulled on my leg and reached up with my arms to try and get a grip on the offending cable long enough to release my foot. All the time this is happening I had this big bag of equipment pressing down into my nether regions and I was screaming at the parachute rig for being a complete asshole!
After a superhuman feat of exertion I managed to free my leg and immediately fall the right way up. Now all I had to do was pull the lever below my reserve chute and allow the equipment bag to drop down the three meters until the cable connecting it to the parachute rig went taught. This was precisely what my brain ordered my hand to do but my hand had an opinion all of its own. "Are you sure that this lever does actually drop the bag down three meters?" it asked back to my brain, "Yes I am, pull the lever" my brain responded, but still my hand wasn't so sure, "Are you sure that this isn't a special release lever for the whole rig and that pulling it won't simply see us fall out of the harness and to our deaths below?" "Ermmm, yes I am sure, pull the lever" the brain replied,"well you kinda hesitated for a moment there brain, are you sure there's nothing else you want to tell me?" The argument between arm and brain continued for a couple of moments until I pulled the lever and felt the reassuring drop of the bag from between my legs and the somewhat less reassuring tug on the rig as the cable went taught with the thing dangling beneath me.
I then hit the ground, rolled, released the chute and jumped up ready to fight another day.
The next jump was a night jump and the jump after that another day jump, the fifth jump was cancelled due to bad weather. Apparently four jumps was enough to qualify from the course and I had my silver wings and a ticket back to an evil pile of mud in the North of the West Bank.
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