Johnson took the strap for the monkey harness he wore and hooked it into a 0-bolt on the side of the floor of the aircraft just short of the hinge where the ramp began. He played out enough slack so that he could make his way the end of the ramp and then cinched it tight so he couldn’t fall out once the ramp opened.
“Check equipment!” The jumpmaster waved his arms, palms toward his chest. Each man started from his head and worked down, making one last check on their gear, a few semi-squatting as much as the gear would allow to make sure that one of their legs straps was not routed over a testicle.
The noise level on the inside increased abruptly as the ramp began to open. A thin horizontal crack appeared, rapidly growing wider as the top portion of the ramp disappeared into the cavity that housed the large tail of the aircraft and the lower ramp began leveling out.
“Sound off for equipment check!”
The last man in each stick slapped the man in front on the rear, yelling “OK,” and the message was passed up until the front man in each stick looked the jumpmaster in the eye and reported “All OK, jumpmaster!”
The jumpmaster immediately turned toward the open ramp and gingerly made his way around the side of the right Zodiac. He held onto the hydraulic arm that had lowered the ramp and stuck his head out into the slipstream, peering ahead to try and make out the island of Oahu which should be approaching on the side of the aircraft. Satisfied, he came back in and took his place at the front of his stick.
“One minute,” the pilot radioed to Johnson.
“You got the secure signal?” he asked the co-pilot, who was wearing night vision goggles. The co-pilot leaned forward and peered down to the right, where Kaena Point protruded into the ocean. He spotted a flash of light from their strobe in the sand dunes near the lighthouse.
“Roger. We’re good to go.” The pilot relayed the information to the load master
Johnson grabbed the jumpmaster’s shoulder and gave him both the time warning and strobe information, then wedged himself in between the bundle and the skin of the aircraft.
“One minuter” the jumpmaster gave his last time warning.
The eyes of all the jumpers were wide now, the adrenaline flowing freely. The red light high up above the ramp glowed brightly.
Johnson felt his knees buckle and knew that meant they were thirty seconds out and the pilot was bringing them up from 200 feet above the waves to jump altitude at 500 feet.
“Stand by!” the jumpmaster called out, edging forward until he was as close as he could be to the Zodiac. Johnson drew his knife from its sheath, making sure that his assistant load master on the other side of the plane had his out and was watching him. He then focused on the red light.
“Go!” the pilot yelled in the headset at the same moment the light turned green. The razor-sharp edge on Johnson’s knife went cleanly through the webbing holding the Zodiac’s pallet. The pallet slid off, the chute deploying almost immediately and the chem lights disappearing into the darkness below. The jumpmaster was right behind it, waddling off the edge of the ramp and disappearing from sight, the only reminder of his presence the deployment bag fluttering the air behind the aircraft, still held by the static line.
The other six jumpers in the right stick followed, less than half a second between each man.
As the last man in the right stick cleared the ramp, Johnson chopped his arm down, indicating for the other load-master to cut his boat free. The other stick was gone in less than four seconds. Johnson stood and walked to the edge of the ramp, feeling the tug of the safety harness pulling him back. A row of chutes were deployed behind the path of the Talon, the first jumpers already in the water. Johnson turned back and activated the static line retrieval system. A large bolt on each of the static line cables slowly pulled the deployment bags back in. Once they were clear of the ramp, Johnson informed the pilot, and they closed the ramp and dropped back down to 200 feet, pulling a hard left turn at the same time to head for home.
“I counted fourteen jumpers and two Zodiacs on pallets,” Boomer said, the sound of the MC-130 Talon fading into the noise of the surf. The darkened aircraft turned left and disappeared, but not before Skibicki and Boomer had had a chance to positively identify it — there was no mistaking the “whiskers” on the nose for the Fulton aerial recovery system unique to that aircraft.
“Same here,” Boomer edged up on the sand dune until he was kneeling on top in order to be able to see out into the ocean. He caught sight of one of the Zodiacs as it rode a wave then it disappeared again. The chem lights made it easy to pinpoint the boats. Each chem light, almost invisible to the naked eye at this distance, showed up like a spotlight in the night vision goggles. Boomer knew the men out there weren’t happy about having to use the lights, but it was a better alternative to splashing around in the water and not being able to find the boats. As the waves moved he could make out figures moving over the sides of the boats — the jumpers climbing on board. Boomer knew the routine well; he’d done it himself numerous times.
The first man in would check for gas — at night by smell — to make sure the fuel bladder hadn’t ruptured. As soon as the second man was aboard, they would free the engine from its place on the floorboards and mount it with the engine’s clamps on the rear center of the transom. They would also secure it with a retention cable that was anchored on one side of the boat, so they wouldn’t lose the engine in case the boat capsized. It was secured to only one side so they would be able to right the boat from the water.
“Hear it?” Skibicki asked.
“Yeah.” Boomer caught the cough of the engine starting.
The sound of its running was lost in the surf and distance.
He knew the two boats were holding in place, waiting to collect all their swimmers. Then they would be off, but which way?
Skibicki twisted around and glanced inland.
“I didn’t see any IR strobe,” he noted.
“Maybe there wasn’t one, or maybe there was another message.”
“Could have been down in the dunes,” Boomer noted.
“They could see it from the cockpit.”
“I didn’t see any coverage either,” Boomer said.
“They could be out there blacked out,” Skibicki said.
The lights on one of the boats suddenly went out. All were aboard.
Boomer focused his attention on that spot, maintaining its location through his goggles, catching sight of the lowlying silhouette as it crested each swell. He was unaware of the wavering red dot of light that had suddenly appeared in the center of his back. The dot shifted, moving over to Skibicki, at first also centering on the back, then slowly moving up toward his head.
“I think they’re turning east,” Boomer said, turning to Skibicki. He threw himself forward and grabbed the sergeant major, the two of them toppling down the beach side of the sand dune as a shot rang out.
Boomer flipped off the safety on the Calico.
“He’s got laser sights. Somewhere up near the lighthouse. Must be security for the jump and our IR strobe man.” He was calculating rapidly, assessing the situation.
“We need to break left.”
“No,” Skibicki said.
“We got to get back to my jeep.
We got to go right.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
“The rocks are slippery, but if we get down in them, we can circle around.”
Boomer accepted that this was Skibicki’s terrain and that the older man had more combat experience. Skibicki moved out, crouching low, keeping the sand dune between them and the lighthouse.
Boomer was glad he was wearing running shoes as they started moving across algae-covered rock. His sneakers were soon soaked, but he maintained a degree of traction.