The Delta Cartoonist: Toad Jumper

Master Sergeant George Hand US Army (ret) was a member of the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, The Delta Force. He is a now a master photographer, cartoonist and storyteller.

Student: "Sergeant, how long do I have to deploy my reserve parachute if my main fails to open?"

Sergeant: "The rest of your life, son... the rest of your life."

There is no argument that Tier-1 units routinely engage in dangerous training: climbing skyscraper structures, engaging in gunfights in close quarters and confined spaces, hunkering down nexts to explosive breaching charges that are barely an arm's reach away as they ignite... A cringe-worthy component to that list that hooks every seasoned operator's attention is airborne operations, because most things that go wrong during them can be fatal.

The feature image, Toad Jumper, is of course a parody of "towed jumper," an airborne term used to describe a paratrooper whose static line, a 15-foot nylon cord that pulls open the jumper's parachute, doesn't separate from the aircraft. On the rare occasion that the parachute pack fails to break free from the static line anchored to the jump aircraft, the paratrooper will be towed behind the aircraft at ~120MPH spinning and slamming against the airplane. It is a horrid and deadly event.

Paras line up and hooked up. Static lines are hooked to anchor cable; they are routed correctly OVER the men's arms. Mac's had looped under his arm.

My best friend and renowned firearms trainer Patrick Arther "Mac"McNamara was a towed jumper on his very first training jump with the Army's Airborne School in Ft. Benning, GA. His static line had unfortunately looped under his arm, cushioning the tug of the line and preventing it from effectively pulling his parachute loose.

Mac spun wildly and bounced off of the kin of the aircraft... then his static line fortunately was able to pull away his pack and deploy his parachute canopy correctly. The violent tug of the static line ripped his biceps muscle from his humerus bone and pulled it down to his forearm. He was in severe pain and unable to use his damaged arm.

When it rains it pours, and since Mac was not able to use his arm, he could not steer his parachute for a safe up-wind landing. Rather than face into the wind a parachute defaults to running down (with) the wind at higher speed. Mac braced himself, cringing before the impending impact with the ground.

Patrick McNamara frame grab from one of his training videos reveals the gnarly scar on his left biceps, a staunch reminder of being a towed (toad) jumper

He hit with great speed tumbling and flipping in excruciating pain. Landing is the most critical step in a jump that the jumper can have the most control over. The jumper must correctly assess the wind direction and turn himself to face into the wind by maneuvering the lines that suspend him from his canopy.

A paratrooper must perform a proper Parachute Landing Fall (PLF) to preclude broken bones and other injuries, and finally, a jumper must quickly securehis parachute to prevent being dragged across the ground resulting in potential death.

Now, the instructors on the Drop Zone, the Black Hats, saw Mac's cartwheel landing and began to scream at him through electrically amplified megaphone:

"HEY LEG! WHO THE HELL TAUGHT YOU TO DO A DOWN-WIND LANDING, LEG!"

A leg was a term used to refer to a soldier who was not airborne qualified. By military doctrine, soldiers can be referred to as regular straight-leg infantry, and airborne infantry. Leg is a mildly derogatory term, yet a moniker of pride used by airborne forces.

Airborne pipe-hitters from the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) packed in their jump aircraft

Now Mac was being dragged by the wind across the ground further contributing to his anguish, as he could not release his parachute connection on his chest. That further infuriated the Black Hats:

"GODDAMNIT LEG, PULL YOUR CANOPY RELEASES, LEG... YOU STINKING LEG!!!"

A fellow student ran in front of Mac's inflated parachute and collapsed it. Mac now had to stow all of his parachute into a kitbag and carry his gear to an assembly zone where students were gathered... all with just one good arm and the other in extreme pain.

Airborne soldier about to make contact with the ground; always a tense moment

Mac stumbled to the assembly point. His assessment of the event sums up what an amazing warrior Pat Mac is, and why I regard him such esteem to this day (words to the effect): "I didn't really know what to think at the time; I mean, it was my first time and I really had no idea what to expect. To me, that was just what jumping was like... what every jump would be like... and I was willing to accept that."

Pulling open his BDU shirt he saw that his biceps had been reassigned south of his shoulder to his forearm; the skin was stretched so tight that it had taken on a transparent form revealing the color of the sinew and blood vessels thereunder. He showed it to a couple of other students to see if their arms all looked the same way; none did. Only then did Mac realize his plight.

Mac had to have surgery to pull his bicep back up to his humerus to re-attach it, leaving him a gnarly scarred reminder. One of my team brothers in Delta also suffered the same fate as Mac in jump school. His static line looped under his arm. When he jumped he was momentarily towed; his biceps torn and pulled down to his forearm.

His biceps never really recovered to its original position, rather a bit low on his humerus toward his elbow. It really looked funny when he flexed his biceps, intentionally flexing it often in the gym with accompanying remarks such as: "(flexing) Just came in to pump up ol' Betsy here... I know she looks pretty ripped now, but you should have seen how ripped she was in jump school!"

The trauma associated with a towed jumper scenario would easily be "quittin' time" for most folks, with no fault assigned or explanation required. For Pat McNamara it was just one entry in a long line of threats that tried to beat him down and prevent him from obtaining his warrior goal. He went on to be arguably the best physically fit and top-performing Delta Operator of our era, and continues today to even exceed the standards that we maintained in the Unit.