PTSU Freefall
By F/S Lev Leatherland
Members of the Air Force’s Parachute Training Support Unit (PTSU) spent nine days in early June this year at a specialist Arizona USA facility learning the art of freefall. The aim of the training was to gain a large quantity of high quality freefall training in a short space of time.
PTSU Parachute jump instructors conduct a four person formation. (WN-08-0038-15).
For the uninitiated, flying your body in freefall may sound like a relatively easy task. It is not. In order to progress to the level of freefall instructor, many hundreds (sometimes thousands) of freefall descents have to be made, and the skill of manoeuvring your body around the sky is slowly reached after many, many 60 second freefalls.
The obvious distractions of falling toward the ground at 120mph and of having to remember to save your life at the end of the freefall can make the exercise slightly more challenging. The solution is the freefall simulator/vertical wind tunnel. It produces more than enough wind to support several bodies at normal freefall wind speed. You can fly for as long as you like or rather as long as you can handle it (it is very physical). There are no parachutes to pack and no 20 minute rides to 12000 feet to gain that precious 60 seconds of freefall.
The Sky Venture wind tunnel in Eloy Arizona is one of the biggest in the world and is the home of the worlds best skydiving team. We were treated to a lesson in ‘how it’s done’ by these guys on our first day. Watching them through the glass was awe inspiring. We hired a tunnel coach who flew with us for all of the 14 hours we spent in the tunnel. He was invaluable. First he assessed us as individuals. He then flew with each of us, teaching us new techniques and more efficient ways of moving around in freefall. When he was satisfied that we had learned one or two new methods and honed some of our existing skills, he organised us into groups of two and eventually had four of us flying around in the tunnel together, building different freefall formations.
We trained daily between 0615H and 1230H to take advantage of slightly lower temperatures in the morning. The regime began with a fairly easy two minutes flying and 14 minutes off, quickly progressing to a gruelling, 2 minutes on 2 minutes off. In 45°Centigrade, this was strenuous to say the least. This sounds like too much fun for a serviceman to be having during training. The best part is that every member of PTSU who flew in the tunnel is now a great deal more capable of flying their body around the sky. Our individual skill levels are proven and we know where we are going as far as our personal freefall training and skills development are concerned.
Back at Whenuapai, we may be chasing a freefall student, filming a group of free fallers or exiting a C-130 during a Kiwi Blue display. Whatever we are doing in freefall, we are doing it better. Training in the wind tunnel was invaluable to PTSU. Regular training in this kind of facility is training smart. It is exactly the sort of professional approach we are looking for. We are more competent, more confident and that much closer to being the best that we can be.
Statistics:
- 9 days away.
- 4 hours freefall each.
- The equivalent of 250 Freefalls (about 1.5 years training).