An Cosantóir

Airborne, in both senses of the word 14 | Chief instructors like John Walsh, Bill Halliden, Des O'Sullivan and Gerry O'Leary continued to build on the work of the early pioneers, not least by com- peting at CISM on several occasions. These courses were ably admin- istered by the ARW until 1993, since then the courses have been adminis- tered through the Air Corps College. After the redeployment of the Air Corps from Gormanston to Baldon- nel, courses moved for a few years to the Irish Parachute Club drop-zone in Clonbollogue, Co. Offaly, before set- tling back into drop-zone 'Pegasus' on the Curragh plains, where it all began. Over the years, parachuting in the DF has evolved significantly, with ever increasing numbers of person- nel qualified to wear the coveted 'para wings'. Today, DF parachuting is conducted in three distinct, though related, disciplines – static-line parachuting (using round, 'mil spec' parachutes), freefall sports parachut- ing (including competition and dis- play jumping), and special operations parachuting (HALO and HAHO). Each discipline has its own chief instructor and a growing panel of instructors and jumpmasters. Across all three disciplines, serious PARACHUTING From 1972 until 2008, static- line young-entry courses were carried out based on a sports syllabus, using either round or high-performance ('square') parachutes. Since 2009, our five-jump young-entry course has been modified to closely mirror the US airborne jump management system, with trainees jumping at 1,500ft from Air Corps AW139 helicop- ters using round parachutes. This system provides both an airborne capability for the ARW and a 'first timer' adventure training activity for the remain- der of the DF. As each lift can take six STATIC LINE effort has gone into professionalising the delivery of parachute training, especially in the areas of safety and regulation. To this end, a comprehen- sive training instruction on parachut- ing in the DF was signed-off by the Director of DF Training in June 2011. This is now the 'bible' for the conduct of all parachuting in the DF. It situates parachuting in its natural home (the Air Corps) by setting up an ex-estab- lishment Parachute Training School (PTS) as part of the Air Corps College. PTS staff are drawn from across the DF and come together several times a year to conduct parachute training. The School's other main function is the oversight of regulation across all three disciplines. To that end, com- prehensive new SOPs were prepared over the last year, to dovetail with the terms of the new TI. SPORTS PARACHUTING jumpers at a time, this training model also provides an efficient and cost-effective means of conducting ab initio adventure training for the DF at large. The fifth ('wings') jump is now made with Bergen attached, and in the last year PTS and ARW instructors have carried out the first night jumps with kit. This latest development represents a substantial improvement in op- erational capability for the ARW. Also, with an eye to the future, PTS ran static-line jumpmaster courses in 2009 and 2011. STAND-BY!!! Instructor Sport Parachuting, Capt Steve O'Sullivan, has taken the DF's competition team (Fastair) from strength to strength, and between them team members now have a combined total of over 10,000 jumps and hundreds of hours in a wind tunnel freefall simulator. The team exits at 10,000ft and has 35 seconds to score as many formation points as possible. All this training paid off at the CISM PCM is now capable of conducting in-house tandem and AFF (accelerated freefall) training for both sport and military purposes. This year's Advanced Parachute Course concentrated on the accuracy side of training, and on devel- oping the Black Knights display panel. Despite the usual hiccups with weather, it went well, due in large part to the excellent work done by the course staff and the professionalism of the Air Corps crews operating both the CASA and AW139 aircraft. As regards competitive jumping, Chief within current financial constraints, team members spend thousands of euros of their own money each year to fund this programme of training and competition. Fastair also came 7th at the Skydiv- ing World Cup in Dubai last December, breaking their own national scoring record in the process. Earlier this year, the DF team retained its title as Irish national champions for the third year running. While the DF has been very supportive World Games in Brazil last year, when Fastair came 11th of 38 teams in forma- tion skydiving, achieving the team's goal of being the best genuine military team in the world (that is, a team made up of individuals with full-time military jobs outside of parachuting). Competing as the Irish national team, An Cosantóir November 2012 www.dfmagazine.ie 'Fastair' Dubai, 2011 Skydiving World Cup. Photo by Capt Ruarigh McDermott

• Cover