two part series (HALO: Freefall Warriors)
 

B21 will be featured on the Discovery Channel in a two part series (HALO: Freefall Warriors) running from 8:00 pm til 10:00 pm, tonight (26 Feb) on the Discovery Channel.

Was able to catch the first part so far. They did a good job it would seem of covering the course and what it takes to be there. That young PJ is a hardcharging kid, wish they had more of them out there cut from that bolt.

Everyone of them I ever met was a hardcharger. You have a different experience?

Very good overview of the Basic MFF School, IMHO.

Nope, just pointing out that the young stud seemed supermotivated. I guess I could have made my post clearer. I was not saying they should make more PJ's like that, I meant the kids going into the service in general.

I saw some of the show, thought it was funny that the marine couldn't find the door to the place, but appreciate the glimpse into the world of the Quiet Professionals.

Good show. Was only able to see part 2.
Did they ever find the reason for the accident?

If you didn't go to MFF when Mr. Pronier was there, you ain't shit. :D

Mr. Pronier or before I should have said. LOL, sorry FOGs.

Mr Pronier holds the lowest instructor number out there....

MFFI#2


...MFFI#1 was not an instructor.


Also, the FIRST NCOIC of the school was just given his "I" number (500) in September of 2002 almost 40 years after he left the school...


Go figure





the show will be on again at noon on the 28th

It was about a block walk from the Team Room. Gary takes me up and "introduces" me to the instructors. Hobu etc. tells Hobu "Don't send him back until he can fly." And leaves.

In comes this old dude in a jump suit JUST reaming some poor guy out for something.

Somebody says "Who's the grouchy-assed old civilian?"

BOOM!, instant new target for wrath.

Bubba walks in and says, "I see some of you have already met Mr. Pronier." Laughing his ass off.

I tried to steer clear of him, but he got to everybody eventually.

My time came at MACKALL on the first equipment jump. I'm dick dancing around trying to lower the rucksack and not getting anywhere. Runnin' out of altitude and ideas about the same time, so I figure "To hell with it, I'll just ride it in." We used to do it in the 82nd all the time. Well, by the time I made the decision, it was too late to turn into the wind. My best landing ever - runnin' with the wind, riding in Miss ALICE, on the edge of the road. Pain in dimensions and places hither to unknown. NO skin on the shins from the ALICE frame. I hurt so bad I couldn't breath.

Hobu lands right next to me, beautiful tip toe landing. "Break anything?" Laughing

"No, stop laughing."

"Here comes Mr. Pronier, you should run."

"I can't, I hurt too bad. I'll take the ass chewing."

"Really, I would run if I were you, even if my legs were broken, I'd run. Too late."

Mr. Pronier - "You are one dumbass SOB and you better not have damaged any government issue. NOW do you understand why they invented lowering lines? NOW do you understand why we teach you about the wind?"

"Yes sir"

"Get up and go get another 'chute and hurry the hell up, its not like the rest of us are waiting for you or anything. Wipe some dirt on that blood on your pants, I don't want you scaring the Marines."

LOL - I would have gone out any door anywhere in the world behind that man.

Pronier, Lillico, Preacher Hodge, Cooper, those were real men!

BTW, just saw the MFF School piece, RIP Mark. He was a good man.

TR

TR, NDD, et. al.,

Did y'all ever run across an MFF-I named Don Yahrling? He was/ is a bigwig in USPA's AFF and Tandem programs. We were talking a long time ago and mentioned being an MFF-I in the 70's when the course was at Bragg. Didn't know if you'd ever heard of the man or not or if he ever worked with the MFF course after getting out of the Army.

Oh, and just for reference for the new guys. When you go to MFF School, they will give you a class on canopy characteristics, including speed of foward drive. I don't know if they're still using the MT1XX, but the class I got was "The foward drive of the MT1XX is approximately XX miles per hour."

They don't tell you a couple of things. First, when you land with the rucksack, that number is somehow squared. Don't ask me how, but you will be going at least, AT LEAST, Mach 1 when you hit the ground. Second, if you cut away your main, the reserve's forward drive is cubed what the main was and to a power of ten if you have any other problems or cannot avoid landing on the concrete.

They also give you a rate of descent. If you are NOT over the DZ or any other clearing, the rate of descent doubles for every 100 feet you're short to the next clearing. And I have been told that the R of D slows by half and all forward drive stops when you are being shot at from the ground while under canopy.

They also tell you that if you pull the little red thing, there is a device which will "instantaneously" assist in deploying the reserve. The word "instantaneously" is obviously a very relative term. In my experience (HAHO cutaway at about 17k), it takes at least, at least, 7 days for the reserve to deploy.:D

:eek: I hope the rate of descent goes logarithmic during this period.

NDD,

So, you want to jump my Jedei 120? Reserve is a Raven 135-M.

C'mon, pick it up, I dare you. :D

They use the MC-4, which is the same 375 square foot canopy, main and reserve.

The rate of descent and forward drive are also driven by the weight of the jumper, brother NDD, which means that you and I, along with Jerry and Dale, are in a class only exceeded by No Go Rotundo. I guess when you are over the section of woods that stick out into the middle of Sicily DZ, all laws are repealed.

As the instructors say, when you have a parachute malfunction, you have the rest of your life to work it out. I survived a mid-air entanglement over Mackall AAF myself.

Billy L:

Saw your credits at the end of the piece. You are very good at what you do, hermano.

TR

I'd jump anything anybody else would that's relatively my size, when I was jumping. It was a way for me to get to work and that's all. I have NEVER made a sport jump in my life. Every one was with military gear for a military reason. I hated every one of them and I quit just before every one. Ask Jaime.

However, if you think you are going to frighten me with your hankerchief, you are mistaken. I should have been dead by '92 at the latest. As I have been living on borrowed time for ever a decade anyway, I'm not afraid of shit.





Except clowns, women with big hands and Adam's apples.

Hell NDD, I never expected to see 1972 !!!! And then I made close to 900 Sport jumps on everything from 28' 7TUs to Delta II Parawings with a few early '70s Para-Planes and Clouds thrown in. My regular canopy of choice was a Para-Commander with a Tri-Con reserve.

That reserve saved my ass twice. Once, a streamered main (the deployment broke my collarbone) and once from the door of a Cessna 195 at around 100 FEET when the engine quit and I departed the aircraft. We found the reserve ripcord handle inside the wreckage.

Jumping is relative. It is far safer than the drive any of us make to work every day !!! :D

Later
Martin

Holy CRAP!

AND, I'm STILL HERE !!!! :D

Unless this is an alternate reality, or a bad episode of "The Twilight Zone".

Maybe we are all actually dead people in the PHA, waiting for an afterlife.

TR

We need a new PEHA then.

NDD, just jerking your chain a bit, not trying to piss you off. Oh, our OPSEC guru on the other site? I can have a name, Company, and BN on Monday if you want. I work with a guy that's in his BN. Maybe even get some email addys for his CoC.....

Just a thought.

Thanks, let's see if the lesson is learned. If not...

Roger that. Let me know if I need to pull the trigger.