1981 Times: Killer Wind in the Mojave

[skyshark91]

I missed this post and never heard of this jump. R.I.P.
I did jump in NTC with 3/505 in July 92. Found my roommate knocked out on the DZ. Our 60mm gunner lowering line came undone during loading of the aircraft and the safety re-rolled it, but didn't know that he was goign to lower the weapon case. When he did lower the weapon case the tube went bye bye. We were told that it hit someone in the head and that they were medivaced out along with my roomate.

[RH]

A fuckin Cherry dug this post up from the grave?

great post, great read!

Unfortunate how we forget about these posts, until
they are brought back from the archives by cherries.

[Hendo]

How would this be explained to someone's next of kin? I always think about stuff like that because of the nature of my last return from the 'Stan. It's absolute horse crap to lose people but when you are "pretend fighting" aka training it's unacceptable. I understand the risk but it becomes a non-issue once someone is gone because of it. I could go around and around about it but bottom line is I don't let no Leg get away without knowing that they aren't as good as us .

[z0phi3l]

How would this be explained to someone's next of kin? I always think about stuff like that because of the nature of my last return from the 'Stan. It's absolute horse crap to lose people but when you are "pretend fighting" aka training it's unacceptable. I understand the risk but it becomes a non-issue once someone is gone because of it. I could go around and around about it but bottom line is I don't let no Leg get away without knowing that they aren't as good as us .

I'd given my wife enough stories of close calls that she already had a good idea of the risks associated with jumping. It really got her nervous sometimes, because someone always insuisted that our ToT be ~1am, and she knew night jumps were riskier than day jumps.

[GERONIMO]

I was in the 101st ABN when I met my wife and one thing I never did was discuss what happened on a jump and she never went to watch..
One thing that I have learned about the US Army is that it never learns and carrys forward problems on Airborne Operations. I jumped a PAE bag on Desert Strike in 1964 north of Needels CA.

Exited at 700 ft (OOPS) with a PAE bag that weighed as much as I did coulden't get it dropped so I rode it in. I lander in a pile of rocks and just lay there trying to release the capewells. A General Fink walked up to me and said "are you allright son"? At that time I stated "how the f**k do you think I am? The ass hole just walked away. Yes that was back then but it reallt looks as if nothing has changed. AIRBORNE! GERONIMO!!

[brothers all]

Sig Vet probably got more history on this than me -But '58 Operation Eagle Wing at Ft. Campbell- Lost 5 men-over 100 injured. Understand they dropped the heavy equip first and than the troops. High winds.

God Bless those Paratroopers from the 82nd and the 101st. Yeah- how do you explain that shit to parents and loved ones.

[e14eternity]

this did happen in 1982 not 81 as the thread title suggests
Hate to be a cherry diggin up this post again
what to tell the loved ones and kin-
"For me the message is clear it is not within the deaths of these brave fallen that we find their greatest measure of nobility rather it is within their living days, days marked by sacrifice, duty, service, and faithfulness to their families, friends and comrades in arms," retired Gen. Dan McNeill.... thats just about the best ive heard
i believe this mission is the reason there have been no major airborne operations in the middle east conflicts/wars. The last thing a general wants is a 7% injury rate before you engage the enemy.
Mudge i enjoyed your first hand account of this jump almost 30 yrs removed. From my vantage point , I had crowd control/security, it seemed there was too much movement horizontally as soon as the chutes opened. The streamer as i remember was reported to have happened because of a towed parachutist and the collision cut most of the young troopers suspension cords. I think that was 2 causualties that would have happened winds or not.
I can tell you the next time i went out the door i was a lot more careful of my checks, rechecks and mental emergency drills.

[Purple]

It's absolute horse crap to lose people but when you are "pretend fighting" aka training it's unacceptable.

I don't entirely agree with that philosophy because being at the 'tip of the bayonet' is an inherently dangerous occupation, whether in training or when executing your mission in some foreign land for real. No matter how well prepared you may be, things happen when you're too cold, too hot, too hungry, too tired, too wet, too dehydrated, too stressed, too bored, etc...and you never know what Private Dufflebag or Lieutenant Headuphisfourthpointofcontact is gonna do when they're out there on their own. Sometimes it's preventable and those are inexcusable...but sometimes it's the result of a 'perfect storm' of small events that come together at that particular moment with dire consequences in a karmic sense.

Mortuary affairs in EUCOM used to plan for 35 deaths in practicing OPLAN 4102 in their on-going series of exercises which entailed over 100k troops under very diverse terrain and weather conditions - most years it was far less, but there were always some. One that I remember well was the spring of '77 when our team was acting as a SPETZNAZ unit in the V Corps AO northeast of Bad Hersfeld and came upon an abandoned M-60A3 sited on the edge of a small clearing in a woodline. We reported it and kept it under observation until someone from the unit arrived to retrieve it. We left and found out later that when they recovered the tank, they found the crew underneath it. The investigation surmised the crew had sought to sleep under their tank to stay dry and it had settled in the soft earth as they slept.

One thing I discovered during my time spent in Europe, Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia was that no matter how much or how well you planned, there was always something you would encounter which nobody in the unit had encountered before and was not planned for...and could sometimes lead to a fatal mistake.

And so it goes...

Purple

[steward252]

It seems as if the world has forgotten, I know many have died, and the world moves on, but even though I have seen death since, that day has been burned into my memory forever, mostly because in was a needless waist of troopers lives. Even before the wars in the Middle East when I spoke of Gallant Eagle, it was as if no one ever heard of it, or my fellow troopers who died that day.

So just to get the facts straight, as a member of the Assistant Division Engineers Office, I was on the advanced party for the operation. We flew in on a C130, we ran into head winds trying to cross the Rocky’s and were diverted to a landing zone on New Mexico and had to caravan to fort Irwin, I will hate that place as long as I live. I am somewhat embarrassed to say I received an ARCM, for my actions following the jump, I was recommended for an MSM, but I was an enlisted man so it was downgraded. I am not sure if it was because I took a Lieutenant Colonel's jeep to assist on the drop zone, or because I punched out a peace of shit leg engineer who called us jumping junkies.

Other issues with the post, as I remember the death toll was seven two that later died in the hospital, one who was to have been the Assistant Division Engineer, my CO. I could be wrong, but that is what I remember. The post also left out the hundreds of walking wounded. We were paratroopers; if we can walk, we will complete our mission, even if it is training.
Thank you for letting me post. This was a day that few remember, and I will never forget.

[steward252]

part of this post did not show up so here is the entire post:

It seems as if the world has forgotten, I know many have died, and the world moves on, but even though I have seen death since, that day has been burned into my memory forever, mostly because in was a needless waist of troopers lives. Even before the wars in the Middle East when I spoke of Gallant Eagle, it was as if no one ever heard of it, or my fellow troopers who died that day.

So just to get the facts straight, as a member of the Assistant Division Engineers Office, I was on the advanced party for the operation. We flew in on a C130, we ran into head winds trying to cross the Rocky’s and were diverted to a landing zone on New Mexico and had to caravan to fort Irwin, I will hate that place as long as I live. I am somewhat embarrassed to say I received an ARCM, for my actions following the jump, I was recommended for an MSM, but I was an enlisted man so it was downgraded. I am not sure if it was because I took a Lieutenant Colonel's jeep to assist on the drop zone, or because I punched out a peace of shit leg engineer who called us jumping junkies.
First the description of how the jump happened glosses over a few issues. This was a show of force the Commanders of the 82^nd ABN Div. wanted media coverage, there was another event in California the previous day so they believed they could get the press corps for that event to attend this operation. Now for the part that was left out, even then the decision point should have been 3 Min. out. at that point the jump was a no go, I know I was standing right there on nob hill listing to the radio transmissions, now if memory serves me this was the 2^nd pass the first was also a no go because of wind, anyway, at one minute out the wind dropped enough the command was given to go. Other words this jump should not have happened. I saw the streamer, we were yelling pull your reserve kid, pull your reserve, as if he could hear us. Everything went silent, we had field binoculars in the jeep we look down drop zone gold and saw the troopers hitting the wind shears, no one seemed to have noticed that some of the equipment that have been dropped in the LAPES drop had been overturned I saw a trooper slam into a piece of equipment. I jumped into the jeep that was closest to me and headed for that end of the drop zone, the first trooper I came to had one foot caught in his risers, and was being dragged across the drop zone, two other troopers were attempting stop him, but the wind was too much. As I, grabbed ahold to help, someone pulled a field knife and cut the risers. That trooper was a master sergeant who would later become my first sergeant. I spent the rest of the day transporting the injured.
Other issues with the post, as I remember the death toll was 7 two that later died in the hospital, one who was to have been the Assistant Division Engineer, my CO, I could be wrong, but that is what I remember. The post also left out the hundreds of walking wounded, we were paratroopers, and if we can walk, we will complete our mission, even if it is training.
Thank you for letting me post, this was a day that few remember, and I will never forget.

[steward252]

I feel the need to follow up on this post. The article talks about the devastation on the commanders, it may be true of the mission commanders. However the quotes, at the time, seem to show little concern. One general was quoted as saying the losses would be within exceptable ranges, if this were a combat jump. Another said that is why we get paid $50 a month hazardous pay, even though hazardous duty pay at the time was $82 a month. The article also said the winds at the end of drop zone gold, although it does not mention that name, were 20 knots, that is not even close to what we heard at division HQ, what I can say for sure is I have be in and witnessed unforeseen wind pockets before, and what happened that day was no 20 knot winds. When the troopers hit that wind shear it was like they had been dropped into a wind tunnel, not to mention pieces of equipment were overturned, and dragged across the drop zone, on both silver and gold DZ’s. Commanding General MG James J. Lindsay showed little concern at the time, and very little later, he was no Sandy Meloy he was a politician, plain and simple. I tell this story from the perspective of command and control, although I had no command or control, of any of it but I was there I witnessed the decisions as they were made, an while my memory may be skewed over time, it feels like yesterday.

[Ops NCO]

Steward252 - Welcome to the site, and thanks for contributing. That being said, the site SOP requires that your first post be a new thread in the "Introductions" forum, where you can tell us all about yourself. Please proceed to that location and start typing...

[subtroch]

How would this be explained to someone's next of kin? I always think about stuff like that because of the nature of my last return from the 'Stan. It's absolute horse crap to lose people but when you are "pretend fighting" aka training it's unacceptable. I understand the risk but it becomes a non-issue once someone is gone because of it. I could go around and around about it but bottom line is I don't let no Leg get away without knowing that they aren't as good as us .

My father died in the hospital following this jump from injuries sustained on Silver Drop Zone. I was young and it was tough. I remember being picked up from soccer practice on the Ft .Bragg Polo Fields by a family friend, which was strange. When I got home our house was full of friends from our housing area. Like so many others, my father was dragged after landing. He was in a coma for more than a week IIRC. He came out of the coma and was transferred to Walter Reid after a few weeks. He died about a month after the jump.

[Jumpin' Jack]

I was there. I was a Blackhawk Crew Chief with the 1/17 Air Cav (ABN). The arps were jumping in and I was given the choice to jump or stay with my aircraft as it was loaded out by cargo ship through the canal and up to Port Hueneme, CA. We were there a few weeks before the drop. My picture was in the Fayetteville Times (Observer) reassembling my Blackhawk after pulling it out of the cargo hold. We stayed at Port Hueneme, which was a SeaBee training post at the time, test flying the birds and getting our shit in order until a few days before the drop. We flew east directly over the famous "Hollywood" sign and into Fort Irwin.

steward252 Got a pretty accurate descrption of events and I don't have much that I can add to it except my own now muddy memories of it. I was sitting in my aircraft in our AO plugged in to the radio with my headphones. We saw the first aircraft come and waited for the jump. I heard conflicting stories about go-rounds wind conditions etc. No one seemed to kmow what to do. I didn't see the streamer, but saw as others have stated what looked like a normal jump at first but in seconds it turned into pandemonium. We picked up a few walking wounded and flew them to be triaged. My CO wanted my A/C to get a birds eye view of the situation. We flew to a hover to view the horrific DZ's. The radio was screaming like mad directing medivacs and ground crews. I have not been in combat but this was probably what it must be like I thought at the time. The Cav had one death and several injuries. And, I think the total WAS seven dead.

Rumors flowed about that jump for a long time. It was said that wind conditions were known soon enough to cancel most of the jump if not all but the operation cost too much to be called off. This was one of many.

There was a pall cast over the operation because of the jump but we carried on and regrouped with the ARPs to carry on with our Airborne mission. RIP my Airborne brothers.

Some of my personal memories of it were: flying into Death Valley, getting out of the A/C and walking on what seemed to be the moon, flying back out and seeing in the middle of nowhere a camper with several couples hanging around naked in the sun waving at us. With nothing planned for a few hours one afternoon, we flew 2 Blackhawks and crews into Barstow, landed in a field opposite a greasy spoon restaurant and walked in people staring as if we were aliens that just landed a spacecraft and invading the town. Things settled down and we had some of the most delicious greasy dripping burgers imaginable. A coke and fries and we walked back across the road hopped in the birds and flew back to the AO.

JJ...

[zanshin]

I was a SP4 fire team leader in 1/12 INF (Mech) at Ft. Carson at the time, and we were preparing for deployment to the NTC in late June/early July '82. I had a goofy leg 1LT as platoon leader, a cry-baby ring-knocker Easterner who had finished his USMA degree at Boston College. He had a hard-on for Airborne since he washed out of BAC, and as a prior service soldier wearing wings, a CIB and 82nd patch on my right sleeve, I was a target for him... he couldn't resist happily crowing to me about how fucked up they were on this op when it happened. It was the first I heard of it, and I was hurting inside for the troopers, and pissed as hell at him for his attitude about American soldiers being injured and killed. I muttered "fuck you, Sir" as I turned and walked away with my fists clenched. This skinny Italian kid actually screamed at me to stop and repeat what I had said to him - he was shaking with rage that I would dare be so insubordinate to him, a commissioned officer. I turned around and told him, "I said THANK YOU, Sir -- for explaining to me how you feel about the incident." People were looking at us out in front of the CP since they'd heard him yelling, and he didn't want to escalate it, so he just mumbled "oh, I ..uh... that's all. Carry on." Later at Irwin he got us down in a rocky ravine where our 2 of M113s threw tracks, he actually broke down and cried like a bitch while giving an op order because he was "so tired and hot," and finally had to be led off by the PSG to try and square him away.