Long time, no posts..Wanna hear about Airborne School?

Hi everyone...I honestly forgot about this blog for a while...just got busy spending time with the family, you know? I figured since I have some time this weekend, that I might update whoever cares to read this on what's been going on with me.
I'm currently sitting in the Army Lodging room provided to me at Ft. Benning, Georgia. I got the opportunity to come here to attend Airborne school, which is about 3 weeks long. I've always wanted to try it and get the chance to jump out of planes and after the Captain's career course at Ft. Sill was over, my branch manager allowed me to come here:)
The first week of Airborn is over..it is what they call 'ground week'. We learn parts of the parachute harness, how to wear it, how to properly exit the aircraft, and what to do when we exit the aircraft the first and second days. By the second day, we were jumping out of a 34 foot tower rigged up with a harness on and falling until the 'risers' came taught to slide down cables a few hundred feet to a dirt mound. Apparently, psychologists have figured out that 34 feet is exactly the right height to scare the crap out of people. I won't lie...I was a little scared the first jump out, but after that, it was pretty fun:) They give you at least 6 jumps out of the tower and the last 4 jumps have to be done exactly right (with the right body position and proper procedural stuff) in order to get out of the harness for the day. They figure most people don't do the first two right because they're scared and it's new to them.
It's pretty simple...you hook up to the cable overhead...shuffle to the door with one foot in front of the other...hand the line to the 'jumpmaster'...take one step and turn and face the door with your hands on the ends of your reserve parachute, looking out at the horizon...you sound off with your name and roster number...then the 'jumpmaster' says, "GO!" and slaps you on the 4th point of contact (your butt), and you take one step forward kicking your leg up like a punter kicking a football and jump up and out away from the door...simultaneously, as you jump, you tuck your chin to your chest and begin counting, "one-thousand...two-thousand...three-thousand...four-thousand"...all this is supposed to be done with your eyes open! When you've finished counting, you are supposed to look up and grab your 'risers' (the straps connecting you to your simulated parachute) and ensure they're separated while simulating looking for abnormalities in your parachute. When you get to the end of the cables towards the dirt mound, you pull your legs up into an 'L' position and pull up on your risers to go over the mound before sliding back to it and being caught by a couple guys waiting there to unhook you. Once unhooked, you run back to the 'Sergeant Airborne' for a critique on how you did before going to do it all again!

Wow, after typing it out...it doesn't seem so simple, but it really isn't that bad. The next two days we spent learning how to prepare to land, and land (a.k.a. fall) by conducting what's known as a 'Parachute Landing Fall', or PLF. Day one of PLFs, we learned as a group first the basics of what right looks like, and then practiced in a huge gravel covered pavillion as a class doing the PLFs to the right, left, and front-right and front-left. After practicing as a class, we were broken down into 'sticks' (squads...18 Soldiers). We then practiced 'landing' by jumping sideways to the left and right from a two-three foot wall and conducting a proper 'PLF' and receiving a critique from the Sergeant Airborne instructor. Following the wall drills, we began simulating landing while drifting left, right, and front using what they call the Lateral Drift Apparatus...which is really just a cable trolley that you hold onto like a pull-up bar and slide down a cable that makes you hang a few feet off the ground. While sliding down the cable it is supposed to simulate holding onto your risers and drifting in a direction due to the wind during descent. So, we start by climbing up some steps, grab onto the apparatus, the Sergeant Airborne will say, 'clear the platform' and you pick yourself up to slide down, facing wichever way you need to in order to practice falling on your right, left, or front. When the Sergeant Airborne says, "land", you let go of the apparatus and do a proper 'PLF'. We pretty much did that for a day and a half, with the last half-day being PLFs to the rear-left and rear-right...so you're sliding backwards down the cable toward the ground.
The only other thing that we learned this week was half a day on what to do after landing to recover your parachute and get off the drop zone. That consisted of a demonstration and then practical exercise with two different techniques to recover your parachute and pack it into what's called the 'Aviator's kit bag'. The next portion included how to avoid being dragged across the drop zone by your parachute after landing, by activating your 'canopy release assemblies' that attach your harness to the risers on the parachute. We simulated being dragged by the parachute by...being dragged by two other Soldiers pulling on a set of risers attached to your harness and then having to activate the 'canopy release assemblies' while being dragged.
The last day, we just cleaned up the training area in preparation for the next class to use it and had our safety brief for the day...oh, I guess it would be wrong of me not to include the PT that we do in the morning...Monday morning...Army Physical Fitness Test. Tuesday, we did intervals and random exercises in between. Wednesday, we went for a 3.2 mile run around a .8 mile track in formation. Thursday, we did front, back, go's in the gravel pavillion in our ACUs. Friday, we did a 3.2+ mile run in formation as a company.
Then...as you can expect, last night I did laundry and played some Xbox360 (the new Halo3 ODST game that just came out) with my buddy, Shiggy who is stationed here for the manuever captain's career course. This morning... I slept in until almost 11 after going to bed around 2 a.m. and now, you have this rambling blog post about my last week. I'll probably try to post more tomorrow about a little of the whirlwind that has happened to get me to Airborne school, but for now, this is plenty, and I need to eat some lunch (breakfast)!