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Thanks RN, JA. C-17 it is then. A biggg can o whoopass, for sho.

Yeah Doc, Huey jumps were great as were tailgate jumps. I only did one of each.
I went on to do some skydiving after the military. That was before I grew up and figured out that kinda stuff could kill ya.
As for the wind dummy, I don't know why they never ask me to do it, since I met the dummy part of the profile.

Okay, one more 'war story'. Talking about the first guy in the door, Dean.

This will be a little long, 'cause I can't tell it without a few details.

When it was really windy on the ground the cockpit crew would get the OK to make the drop from the ground controllers. If it was over a certain wind speed, sometimes we would wind up 'not' jumping and return to the airfield.
I always hated to have that happen, after all the prep to get all your gear on and hang around til they were ready for us to board...then fly around for given time..watch some guys loose their breakfast, then not jump. Bummer..

A trooper was consider a "cherry", when he got to his assigned unit after jump school. That wen on until he had his 1st jump with the unit. The seasoned guys would ride the new guys til they made that first jump. ('Hey cherry, shine my boots', get down and get 10(like Doc said), and other such BS.)

We were on one of those very 'windy day' kind of jump days. I don't remember what month it was in the spring.
Just so happened the first guy in the stick was a cherry jumper, and he had been catching it all morning long from some of the guys as to whether he would chicken out or make the jump. (There were a few who quite even after completing jump school.)
We were on the jump run, on our feet and hooked up and this guy was in the door and ready..
The jumpmaster got the word from the crew to NOT make the drop. He slapped the cherry on the back and said NO GO.. Mr. cherry was so fired up, all he heard was GO. He didn't wait for the green light.. he just jumped.
The jumpmaster about came unglued.
'Problem was, we were about 5 minutes or so, and maybe 30-35 miles or more from the drop zone.
They had to send out a patrol to find the guy.
He was the talk of the barracks when he got back. He caught a lot of flack for it, but nobody called him a cherry any more.
Very funny situation to us, but not very funny to the brass..
He also gained the nickname 'Quickdraw' from it. And, before anybody asks, no it wasn't me.

Mr. Ducker, that question cross my mind before about every jump as a fleeting thought.

They had to send out a patrol to find the guy

Great story!

I've often been asked how hard was the first jump and I answer "piece of cake!" I was so hyped I probably would have jumped without a chute. After that the anxiety started when I began
to realize just what I had done!

I think it was the third jump at Benning when the ground guys began yelling for people to check their chutes and backup white chutes began popping all over the LZ. Funny!

My best friend in service, Dr. Kelly Roberts (Baylor All-American 1964), had a malfunction on his very first jump....sorta ruined his day! He used to give the riggers hell!

Kelly and I provided dental care for several members of the Golden Knights show team and as a tradeoff got to jump with them a lot when they were having practice days over at the deserted strip
west of Bragg. They would take a truckload of chutes and guests could jump as much as they wanted. We really had some great times with them tailgating from a 130 at 4-6K
with the jumpmaster spotting for us off the tail. Lots of those guys were among the ones killed and injured when the team C47 crashed leaving Bragg.

Nothing like the AIRBORNE! ALL THE WAY SIR!

qoutrage great story, that was funny

not to be boring but one more note and vid....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NVqVKwHmTA

Watch the birds as they descend to altitude and jump speed.....they cut inboard jets and "flutter" downward and drop tail for jumpers and then up and away as jump speed
is slower than their landing speed. The angled crankout doors with the holes are for protection from engine blast.

Thanks for the comments, Doc, Dean. We really should be writing all that kind of stuff down for our grand kids to enjoy, I guess. The military was a great experience for me.

Yeah Doc, they drill you so much in JS, that first jump is pure reflects. They had us too fired up to be scared. I did go to sleep the night before, thinking about it, though.
Wish I'd have had that G/K jump opportunity.
I worked in the Div HQ signal office for a while, and there was some opportunity for an extra jump from time to time. The C-46 jump I mentioned was one of them.
The Twilight Zone guy, Rod Sterling, was a WWII vet and his company was doing a production about a night jump during the war, so I volunteered to be on the manifest. They gave us a 10 foot static line extension to make sure we got under the tail before the chute deployed. All I can remember is, it sure was dark out there.
That video is great. We were hearing a lot about the 141 before I got out in '64. I don't think it went into service for another couple of years.

Hey, DT..Thanks again for the thread. Fun stuff to talk about for us old timers.

qoutrage wrote: We were hearing a lot about the 141 before I got out in '64. I don't think it went into service for another couple of years.

Hey, DT..Thanks again for the thread. Fun stuff to talk about for us old timers.

Two of mine were from a C-141 in school, it was totally different from the prop C-130. They said they slowed it down as much as they could but as soon as you stood in the door it sucked you out and you were going every which way until your shoot opened.

We deployed on a field training exercise and they took most of our equipment on a C-5A, now that baby was huge, they parked two duce 1/2 side by side and still had plenty of room on the sides. The load master, saw my jump wings and said you need to see her setup for troop jumps. I could not imagine how many troops you could pack in one of those.