Stories

Forty Below

It was hot in the C141 Starlifter. In-flight rigging is always a pain, but the Air Force made it worse by refusing to turn down the heat. We were sweating, a bad thing when parachuting into below-freezing weather.

We would train with the Canadian Commandos for twenty-eight days, 80 miles north of North Bay, just shy of the Arctic Circle. The temperature was minus forty in Petawawa, Ontario. A storm had covered Anzio Drop Zone with three feet of snow.

Our Battalion Commander personally briefed us on the mission and its importance to relations with the Canadians. Don't worry, he told us, you will work up a sweat coming off the drop zone.

He was either a damn liar or didn't have a clue and the Scouts, most from the South, were too ignorant to question him. 

Mitch and I were the Jumpmasters. He was the Primary JM, and I was his Assistant JM. We would dispatch the Scouts from the aircraft and then jump ourselves.

Because of the sweat we would work up as we moved through the snow, we wore black boots, field pants, wool shirts, field jackets, and black gloves.

We had packed our arctic equipment in our Alice Packs, which we rigger to lower before hitting the ground. Mitch and I carried our PRC-77 Radios and the other gear for our jobs as Scout Squad Leaders. My ruck had to have weighed 130 to 140 pounds.

We could hardly stand when the time came for the Twenty-Minute time warning.

At six minutes out, the Air Force opened the jump doors, which sucked out all of the heat in the cargo compartment. Mitch and I took control of the bird, stood up and hooked up the Scouts, and began our door-checks, a series of safety checks, including hanging out of the aircraft door, looking for other aircraft, ground timing markers, and the drop zone. I was immediately frozen and numb.

After struggling to pull myself and my ruck back in the door, I turned toward Mitch to confirm the upcoming one-minute time marker and warning. Mitch mouthed one word to me - Fuck. He and I knew this was going to be a pain festival. We had never felt cold like this; we're both from Alabama.

Perhaps not as cold as Mitch and I, but still freezing, the boys did a great job exiting the bird when the green light came on. I jumped after my stick, hoping Mitch's stick went as well and that he wouldn't have to Racetrack. I had a perfect canopy. I'm not sure I could have pulled my reserve even though we had reversed our rip-cord grips for easier access.

I took a quick look around. I had my own air. I looked over and saw Mitch descending not far from me. I began preparing to land, looking for the quick-release straps to lower my ruck. I tried to pull them but could not grip the nylon with my frozen hands. I grabbed the right strap, wedging it between both hands and managed to release it. My ruck dangled from my harness at a leg-breaking angle by one strap. The other strap was nowhere to be seen.

I continued to dig for it until I noticed the ground rapidly approaching and running away behind me. I tried to pull my risers to slow my lateral drift but couldn't grip them. All I could do was put my feet and knees together and hope for the best.

When I hit the ground, I tumbled, embedding myself deep in the snow, completely entangled in my suspension lines, and held in place by a constant wind filling a full canopy. I couldn't even reach for my knife.

I thought if I collapsed my canopy, maybe that would release the pressure so I could get out.

I worked my hands up to my left canopy release, used both hands to release the clip, threaded both thumbs through the loop, and pulled hard. That stretched me out like a Saxon peasant on a Norman rack, worse off than before.

I began yelling for Mitch to save me, convinced that they might find me on the drop zone in the morning, dead and frozen.

I heard a crunching sound coming from behind me. It was Mitch. “Whadda you want, Boy? I'm too cold for your nonsense!”

Cold as he was, he was having a great laugh at my predicament. He collapsed my canopy and began hacking at my suspension lines with his Bowie knife. When I could move, he went off to recover his kit while I got my shit together, packed my chute, donned my ruck, and prepared to move out.

I waited on him since I was between him and the assembly area. We could see it off in the distance, about a thousand meters away, smoke billowing out of the chimney. It had to be warm there! While I waited, I was able, somehow, to get my Arctic Parka out of my ruck. Mitch did the same before joining me.

We began our movement to warmth.

The day before, the sun had come out long enough to put a top crust on the snow so thick that there would be no trudging through it. It was hard enough, in some spots, to support the weight of your average paratrooper, his heavy ruck with a parachute and M1950 weapons case. In some places, it wasn't. Our movement to the assembly area became a constant struggle of climbing out of a hole, putting on our rucks, throwing our chutes over our heads, taking a few steps, and then crashing in the snow, over and over.

After almost breaking our necks as the Reserve and Main went a different direction than our neck, head, and helmet, we figured out that if we drug our chutes, we could mostly stay on top of the snow. We threaded our M1950 leg strap through the kit bag handle and tied that to our weapon's sling, which made all the difference.

Still, the going was slow and cold. At forty below, you do not work up a sweat. If you do, you're dead. At forty below, you are just Cold!

For the next two hours, Mitch and I kept each other going. I would quit, exhausted and delirious. He would get me back on my feet. Then it was his turn. Once, his voice began training off to my right. I looked up, checked the smoke to confirm I was still going in the right direction, then asked where the hell he thought he was going. “I'm headed South where it is warm!” To this day, he claims he was kidding or playing a joke on me. That's Bull Shit! There was no kidding that day; this was survival.

When we finally closed in, we found the Platoon in tatters. We all had second-degree frostbite. Two had to go to the hospital with third-degree frostbite on their fingers and toes. Many were picked up by the Canadians with snowmobiles, starting from the leading edge of the DZ opposite us. Mitch and I were among the few who walked in and had walked the farthest.

The Canadians couldn't believe we jumped; they weren't that stupid. They did a great job figuring out we were in trouble and came to our rescue.

For the balance of the exercise, they split us up with their companies and platoons. They issued us their equipment and trained us in their ways. I firmly believe that we would not have survived there as an American unit with the kit we brought. Hell, we didn't even have tents or stoves.

Before we jumped into the exercise, the Commandos trained us on their kit and tactics. We jumped, this time, with snowshoes, which made all the difference. One night, the temperature dropped to minus eighty below, but we were in our Canadian tents, in our wonderful Canadian sleeping bags, on our Canadian air mattresses, comfortable and happy. On the return jump before going home, with snowshoes, I was the first into the turn-in point, beating even the Canadians. What a difference.

Three jumps with them qualified us for Canadian wings, and we gave them ours.  We held an exchange ceremony before we went home. We air-landed at Pope in 28-degree weather, and it felt warm. We went through US Customs (it seems they lost a Sten Gun while we were there) on Green Ramp in shirt sleeves, happy to be home, and swearing we would never, ever go back to Canada.

Two weeks later, we jumped into Panama, 85 degrees and 100% humidity. Like almost every Scout, I passed out on the drop zone. They found me in a ditch along the centerline road, my ruck still on, my M203 in hand, and my Main and Reserve around my neck, helmet on, and chin strap down.