For your fund of trivia ...Parachute flares were used in Vietnam regularly for night low level reconaissance in the Australian AO. The idea was the FW top cover aircraft started a stream of them from 1500 feet when you arrived at the area of interest; the helicopter descended to normal Tactical Low level and began the recce. The top cover was supposed to have Flare 3 igniting just as Flare 1 was burning out. That was the theory. What really gets your transition from VFR to IFR skills smartened up is when you get 2 duds in a row, which happened. Very exciting being in amongst trees at 60 knots in a 45 degree bank when someone flips the light switch OFF.