'Because It Has No Doors'

Army's Golden Knights Parachute Team Lights Up Night Skies

Last updated Saturday, May 24, 2008 8:04 PM CDT in Living

By Laurinda Joenks
The Morning News

'Flying Is The Best Part'

The Golden Knights are elite parachute demonstration teams based at Fort Bragg, N.C., explained Staff Sgt. Brandon Valle, a demonstrator from North Richland Hills, Texas.

The active duty soldiers trained for various jobs in the Army, but after a selective assessment, each member of the team earned this current assignment. Some team members earned their wings as parachutists in the civilian sphere; the military trained others.

The Golden Knights test equipment and procedures for use in combat, but the groups are used primarily as a recruiting tool, Valle said.

"We give an image, a face to the Army," he said. "We show what the Army is capable of - hitting a target at an exact location."

After the daylight jumps in Fort Smith, the demonstrators remained at the target site, talking to audience members as they packed their parachutes.

"Flying is the best part," admitted pilot Allen Aber, a retired Army warrant officer. "But meeting the people and seeing the neatest parts of the country is really good."

The team makes about 300 jumps a year, including five at Fort Smith, explained Sgt. Dan Cook of Loveland, Colo.

And this number doesn't include practice jumps. The team trains for about six weeks each winter in Yuma, Ariz., and perfects routines weekly at their home base.

But practice flights on location usually prove useless, Meyers said, because winds can change drastically by the time of the performance.

Instead, the team "dry dogs" each flight, practicing their in-air maneuvers on foot. "Open at 2.5 (thousand feet above the ground)," Meyers instructed before the 8:45 p.m. takeoff for the night flight. Team members hooked pockets, so they'd know who was pulling on whom in the formation. "If you don't see each other, you know to open at 2.5."

Then members donned gold-color flight suits, pulled black parachute packs on their backs and kind of skip-jumped to secure straps around their legs. Pyrotechnics were strapped to their boots like spurs, and ignition wires secured to their legs with rubber bands. Buckles and straps were checked and rechecked by teammates throughout the flight.

Team members buckled in for take off. Crew chief Staff Sgt. Robert Gordon pulled up the plane's steps, folded them and stowed them in a cubby in the tail - but he shut no doors.

"Have you ever flown in a plane with no doors?" several team members asked the reporter.

Gordon clapped twice, and walked past the team to his station at the front of the plane, slapping hands with each Knight as he passed.

Meyers issued one last warning: "Don't fly into the pyro burn."

'How Can They Do That?'

The excitement seemed to build as the engines roared to life.

"What's it like being a human bomb?" mused Sgt. 1st Class John Berentis of Yuma as the plane taxied to the runway. "You're going to jump out of a plane. But, wait, there's more - we're going to light you on fire. Wait, there's more - we're going to strap your whole chest with pyrotechnics."

"You get over the nerves after about 100 or so jumps," Cook said. The newest member of the team, he had logged just 495. Meyers totals more than 3,700.

"Then you're just nervous that you do good enough that your peers don't harass you," said Sgt. Steven Robertson of St. Louis.

All team members make jumps, but they also rotate jobs such as narrator and videographer during flights. Robertson wore the helmet-cam for this flight. The footage is used for historical documentation, by the team's public relations staff and to review and critique their jumps.

Soon, the familiarity of the routine became apparent. Several members yawned. Meyers blamed it on a 5:30 a.m. (Eastern Daylight Time) run, not boredom.

But as soon as the plane's wheels left the ground, the excitement returned.

Meyers threw on his "frap cap" (a French leather aviator's cap, he explained) as a signal to start, and the other team members raced to don theirs.

As the plane climbed to 2,000 feet, Watts and Meyers knelt on all fours at an open doorway and put their noses at the lip of the opening, looking at the ground below. Watts dropped a mini-chute holding cylume sticks, and the observation became intense.

Watching how the glow sticks floated to the ground told the parachutists how the winds were blowing, to help them determine from where they should jump to hit the target, said Sgt. 1st Class Charles Cooley, jumping this day near his hometown of Cedarvale. Meyers signaled to Gordon at the front of the plane, who relayed the information to pilot. Observations and adjustments to the flight patterns and location were made throughout the flight. Once the exact coordinates were determined, Aber programmed his GPS system, so he could hit it at jump time, Cooley explained.

As Watts and Meyers continued their vigil at the door, other demonstrators joined them, seemingly held in the plane by nothing more than a hand braced on a wall or a finger hooked in the grill of a light fixture.

"It's OK. I fall out, I've got a parachute on," Cooley laughed.

"That proves you can't be sucked out of a plane," Cook said. "The G forces pretty much keep you in."

As the plane circled higher, the nearly full moon periodically shined through the open door.

"A full moon really helps our flight," Cooley said. "It helps the audience see what we're doing."

"We're at 7,500 feet," Cook said a few minutes later, looking at his altimeter. "We're about three-quarters of the way there."

Other demonstrators stayed in the forward cabin of the plane to keep warm - where a single door was closed. At 10,000 feet, the air temperature streaming in the aircraft's open doors would be about 34 degrees plus wind chill, Meyers said.

As Cook blew his warm breath over his gloved hands, Master Sgt. Kalinda Hendricks sent him forward. "He needs to get his hands warm so he can open his chute," she said.

The demonstrators would jump at 12,500 feet that day, Valle said before the flight

Watts would jump first, with another duty to complete before his narration began. As he fell, he took wind speed readings at various levels, relaying that information back to the team to help determine the best opening.

Then the plane would take a "dry pass," with no one jumping, and on the next round, "It's all out," Valle said.

After jumping, Watts would open his chute at 2,000 feet, Cook explained. He'd spend about one minute in free-fall and one and one-half minutes under his chute. However, Robertson, the flight's videographer and the last out, would open at 6,000 feet and spend seven to 10 minutes under his chute, Cook continued. He would trail a chain of pyrotechnics behind him.

Inside the plane wasn't the best seat in the house, however. The reporter missed the show as the pilot banked soon after the team jumped.

Four-year-old Brooks Cartwright of Springdale, a real airplane fan, saw the whole thing from his grandparents' house above the Fort Smith airport.

"He wanted to know what a parachute was," said Brooks' grandmother Frances Willis. "Then he asked, 'How can they do that?'"

Brooks was spellbound, confirmed his mother Suzanne. "'He'd say, 'Wow, Momma! Did you see that?'"

'It's A Good Feeling'

At the end of the dry-dog session, the jump team huddled up and gave a "Go Knights!" cheer. They let out a "Whoop!" as the plane began its taxi.

Standing waiting for the jump, members slapped hands and bumped fists, in a gesture of good luck. And the reporter on the flight was included in this ritual.

But these aren't superstitions, Meyers insisted. "We all work as a team, and these are things we do as a team together."

"And the team is a family," Aber said.

"The Army prides itself on its safety record and training," Watts said.

Team members attached red cylume sticks to the fronts of their riggings and green ones to their backs.

"Green means go; red means stop," Cooley explained. "When you're flying at the same level, you know whether you can approach someone or not."

Valle explained emergency procedures to the reporter immediately after handing over an air sickness bag and ear plugs. He pointed to the fire extinguisher and first aid bags, "but you won't need to worry about using them," he said. "The crew chief will take care of it. He's wearing a black suit. Pay attention to the crew chief. He'll tell you what to do."

Gordon whistled in acknowledgment, and proving Valle's words to be true, he checked on the lonely reporter after the team left.

"Let us know if you need anything," Valle continued. "If your ears are bothering you, if you need a coat or gloves. We've got them." Other team members repeated the offer throughout the flight.

Valle double-strapped the reporter - and even her camera - in with two seat belts. Sitting next to the open door was only a fright as the plane immediately left the ground, when the nose was pointed up sharply and gravity pulled toward the tail - and that open door. Once the climb became gradual, amazement and excitement took over - and Aber's ride was smoother than many commercial flights.

But why would the Knights jump away from all this?

"Why would I jump out of this plane? Because there are no doors on it," Cooley joked as if the answer was obvious.

"It's a good feeling," Watts said. "It really can't be measured. You have to do it to understand."

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