Military trucks dropped from airplane during night

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

Shooting Humvees out of a C-17 at Night

Night C-17 Airdrop of 4 Humvees Jeeps. C-17 from 517th Airlift Squadron dropping equipment and airborne infantry during training September 2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nT2bRWT5-gM

A couple of days ago, I heard VERY CLOSE turboprop engines wailing, so I dashed out onto my deck in time to witness a C-130 in a zoom-climb from what appeared to be just a couple of hundred feet above the Delaware River. As the airplane banked to the right it exposed the rear of the airplane so that I could see that the loading ramp was down. It appeared to me that there was a flood light inside, illuminating the cargo area. I have no idea what that crew would have been doing in my neck of the woods unless they were just saying "Hi" to someone!

My Dad was Air Force and for cargo a/c he flew C-119's in the Korean war dropping Air Borne and supplies then C-130's stationed in Japan. At the beginning of WW2 straight out of high school he was selected as a B-25 pilot then instructed B-25's for a year. He finally was released for combat duty flying B-25's where he learned the importance of knowing what works right after all the in theater modifications done to B-25's. While flying C-119's his crew member Evart was the man who perfected the drag chute and parachute deployment mechanism to get instant results. Before Evart it was toss a chute out the back. Since then there have been many happy campers on the front line with excellent results hitting the DZ.

Funny thing is some guys doing combat drops can end up complaining about long hard hours. The quickest solution my Dad found was have the pilot fly the war dead out of Korea. Man never complained again about dropping supplies to soldiers on the front after a couple flights of coffins.

Back in the late 1960s I was a Combat Controller under an Aerial Delivery group at Dover AFB. We did this kind of thing day and night without GPS, night vision goggles, or any other new fangled toys. We marked the drop zone with orange plastic panels during the day and small battery powered 'Sandbag' lights at night. Our pilots were VERY good at placing the loads right on target!

Watch your toes boys!

I did in former times by night at the german paratroopers.
It was quite simple: The plane gets a signal (like a flashlight) and then out....

But today???

After the Humvees cleared, 50 paratroopers jumped too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_tflYu0bfE&feature=related

WOW, That was very interesting.... Would have liked to have seen the landing :)

Very entertaining to watch. I understand night-ops are trickier than daytime, but that's what training is all about. Are Humvees considered 'heavy trucks' now? The uniforms indicate 'this is how we do it now'. Glad things have improved somewhat since the last millennium.

Military missions are inherently dangerous. Some things have changed over the years.
For example, 15 years ago it was reported as:
http://articles.latimes.com/1987-07-02/news/mn-1886_1_cargo-plane

later, on YouTube it's
http://www.kodiak.tv/videos-c-crash-c-hercules-drop-disaster-%5BFqPDe-nZK6w%5D.cfm

There was another video where the vehicle snagged on the ramp with predictable results, but I didn't find it.

Straightleg 91B20

Sure hope it was "heads up" on the ground

wow....it would be a terrible thing to have a truck snag any part of the plane or worse a serviceman on the way out.....nice video

i have got to admit it would be pretty cool to see one of those launched but. the must have flares to guide the drops at night