Originally Posted by
brakedwell
Regarding parachutes, some of the SAS during our detachment at Ibri tried very hard to get me to drop some of them out of our Twin Pioneer free fall while flying very low and as slow as possible. (About 45 mph minus the wind) They reckoned the Tin Pin would be going only a bit faster than a one ton truck, which they had practised jumping out of at speed. I chickened out, knowing the sh*t that would be stirred if anyone got hurt.
In a similar vein, we were doing low level drop trials with a rigid inflatable and SBS troops on Falmouth Bay Range. The aim was to try and get the boat and the troops close enough after landing so they could quickly get in and do the stuff the SBS do. After several goes, where it seemed just a bit too difficult to get the RIB and its crew close enough, it was decided to try putting the crew in the RIB before release, sans parachutes. Somewhere I have a still from one of the range 35mm cine cameras, showing the RIB coming off the ramp of the Herc with little heads just visible over the side. It worked, but I remain convinced that those blokes were complete and utter nutters.