not seeing anyone else again.
Not even my wife, when I was married. I always felt I was a gambler with nothing to lose. Most people who gamble do so with the things that are important to them; I gambled knowing that if I lost I wouldn't break the bank.
I watched the glowing redheads pack our kit away into the large aluminium Lacon boxes. Once we'd been thrown out and the door had closed again, they'd stow all other evidence that we had been there in the boxes and just sit it out until they were taken care of in London.
Two of the loadies started a sweep with their flashlights to make sure there was nothing loose that could be sucked out as soon as the door opened. Nothing must compromise this job.
We got the order to turn on our own oxygen, disconnect from the aircraft supply and stand by. Sarah was standing in front of Reg 1, who was to tandem jump with her. She had never failed to amaze me. She was an IG (Intelligence Group), the very top of the intelligence-service food chain, people who usually spend their lives in embassies, posing as diplomats.
Their lives should be one long round of receptions and recruiting sources through the cocktail circuit, not running around, weapon strong.
Then again, Sarah had always made a point of finishing the jobs herself.
She was masked and goggled up, looking for all the world as if she'd done this a thousand times. She hadn't; her first jump ever had been three weeks before, but she took her job so seriously that she'd probably read ten books on free fall and knew more facts and figures than all of us lot put together.
She turned and looked for me. We got eye-to-eye and I gave her an everything-is-OK nod. After all, that was part of this job, to look after her.
The loadie motioned us toward the door. Our berg ens each containing forty pounds of equipment, were hanging from our rigs and down the back of our legs. We waddled forward like a gaggle of geese, putting weight on each foot in turn. Thankfully the berg ens hadn't needed to be fully laden. If everything went to plan, we'd be on the ground for only a few hours.
There was a pause of about five seconds as the loadie by the door spoke into his mike to the British Airways navigator, then he nodded to himself and swung into action. The door was about half the size of an average up- and-over garage door. Pulling out all the levers, he swung them counterclockwise, then pulled the handles toward him. Even though I had a helmet on, I heard the massive rush of air, and then a gale was thrashing at my sniper suit. Where the door had been there was now just a black hole.
The tags on the aircraft's luggage containers fluttered frantically. The freezing cold wind whipped at the parts of my face that weren't covered by my mask. I pulled my jockey's goggles over my eyes, fighting against the blast, gripping hard on to the airframe.
Seven miles below us lay Syria--enemy territory. We did our final checks. I wanted to get this jump out of the way, get the job done and be in Cyprus for tea and toast tomorrow morning.
We rammed up close to each other at the exit, the roar of the wind and the jet engines so loud I could hardly think. At last came a handheld red light from the loadie We all joined in with a loud scream: 'Red on, red on!' I didn't know why, no one could hear anything; it was just something we always did.
The loadie light changed to green and he shouted, 'Green on!'
He moved back as we all shouted to ourselves, 'Ready!'
We rocked forward, trying to scream above the roar: 'Set!'
Then we rocked back.
'Go!'
Out and out we spilled, four people on three rigs, tumbling toward Syria. Being the last man, I was pushed by the loadie to make sure there wasn't too much of a gap between us in the sky.
You can now free fall from an aircraft flying at high altitude and miles from the target area and land with pinpoint accuracy. The HAHO (high altitude, high opening) technique calls for extreme weather clothing and oxygen equipment to survive temperatures as low as minus 40 C, especially when a fifty-mile cross-country descent can take nearly two hours.
It has now largely replaced the old HALO (high altitude, low opening) approach, for the simple reason that, instead of hurtling toward the ground at warp speed, with no real idea of where you're going to land or where the rest of the team are once you're on the ground, you can glide gently onto the target sitting in a comfortable rig. Unless, of course, a man in a white coat has recently clipped a bit off the end of your cock.
I felt the jet stream pick me up and take me with it. As the aircraft thunders over you at 500 miles an hour you think you're going to collide with the tailplane, but in fact you're falling and never hit it.
Once I was out of the jet stream it was time to sort myself out. I could tell by the wind force, and the fact that I could see the aircraft lights flashing three or four hundred feet above me, that I was upside down. I spread my arms and legs and arched my back, bunging myself over into a stable position.
I looked around--moving your head during free fall is about the only thing that doesn't have an effect on your stability--trying to see where everyone else was. I could just about see a figure over on my right-hand side; I didn't know who it was, and it didn't matter. As I looked up I saw the taillights of the 747 disappearing way above us, and downstairs, on the floor, there was nothing, I couldn't see a single light.
All I could hear was the rush of air; it was like sticking your head out of a car traveling at 120 mph. What I had to do now was keep stable and wait for the AOD (automatic opening device) to do its bit. The drill is just to assume that it's going to work, but to get in the pull position just in case. I thought, Fuck that. I knew my pull height--30,000 feet, an 8,000foot drop. I moved my left hand up, just above my head, and my right hand down to the pull handle. There has to be symmetry with everything. If you're in free fall and put just one hand out, that will hit the air and you're going to tumble.
I could see the needle on my wrist alti. I was past 34,000. Instead of waiting to feel the pull of the AOD on the pin, I kept on looking at the alti, and bang on 30,000 feet I pulled the handle and pushed my hands up above my head, which made me backslide, which meant the air would catch the drogue chute to bring the main pack out. I felt it move and rock me slightly from side to side. Then bang--it's like running into a brick wall. You feel like one of those cartoon characters that's just been crushed with a rock.
I still wasn't particularly worried where everybody else was in the sky, I just wanted to sort myself out. I could hear another canopy cracking open, and I knew that it was near. I looked up to make sure I had a canopy rather than a big bag of washing above me. The middle three or four cells of the big mattress were full of air. I grabbed hold of the brake lines, the two handles attached to para cord on each side of the canopy, and ripped them from the velcro that held them in position on the webbing straps just above my shoulder and started pulling. There are seven cells to the canopy; by pumping you expose the end cells to air to quicken the process.
I had a look around me now, trying to find out where I was in relation to the others. Fuck, my cock hurt! The leg straps had worked their way farther up my leg and it felt like someone was giving my dick a squeeze with a pair of pliers.
Above me I could see Sarah and Reg 1.1 must have had a slow opening of the end cells, as they should have been below me. They were now spiraling past me, his right arm pulling the brake line down to get into his correct position in the stack. Sarah just hung there like a small child as he slotted in between me and Reg 2, who was below me somewhere.
Being the last man in the stack, it was a piece of piss for me; I was just bringing up the rear. As long as I was directly above and just touching the rear of the canopy below me, I wasn't going to get lost, unless Reg 1 got lost with Sarah. Reg 1 would be doing the same to Reg 2, who was at the bottom; he'd be doing all the navigating and we'd just be checking. And if the worse came to the worst, we could actually shout to each other once we'd got off oxygen.
Reg 2 would be looking at the display on his sat nav (global positioning device, via satellite). All he wanted was one bar in the center of the display.
Technology is wonderful. We were traveling at about thirty-five knots; the canopy gives you twenty knots, and we were running with the wind, which was fifteen.
I checked my height--just over twenty-eight grand--good. Checked the sat nav, good. That was it. Everything was done: the oxygen was working, we were stacked. Time to get comfy. I got hold of the risers that attached the canopy to the rig, and pulled myself up and wiggled my legs to move the leg straps halfway down my thighs.
For the next thirty minutes we minced along the sky, controlling the rig, checking height and the sat nav. I
