I know there’s a few of you here, Paul in Saudi and Bear_nenno come to mind.
The Chinese media have run a small story about the on-going disaster relief in the wake of the earthquake. Essentially, they were attempting to drop a company of men into a remote area that has been cut off from road access. The weather was poor, and 15 pathfinders, led by the commander of the airborne school, jumped in first from 5,000 meters (a considerable height, I understand). Once on the ground, they decided that the terrain and weather was too poor for the rest of the company, equipped with “round parachutes”, to jump and called off the drop, but in any case made there way to the local authorities and re-established communications through their satellite phones.
Does this sound reasonable? Here’s a youtube of the news report in Chinese.
I’m not sure why they wouldn’t have dropped in from a more reasonable height than 15,000 feet. That’s a lot of wind and potential weather to try to steer against whilst parachuting.
They could have flown in much lower than that.
I didn’t watch the video, though. There may have been a reason why, like Al-Qaeda in China, operating at the behest of a resurrected Musab Al-Zarqawi.
As a Army Paratrooper, I feel the need to offer my WAG. The first pass may have been the pathfinders dropping in. 15,000 ft would mean that the men were trained in HALO (High Altitude Low Opening) operations or HIHO operations. They would be better able to get to somewhere safer to land if the terrain and weather were not appropriate. I didn’t look at the video either, but usually we have better ways of identifying if a Drop Zone (DZ) is safe other than sending Paratroopers out.
Weather does make a difference. If the wind is blowing too strong, it may be impossible to hit the identified DZ. Clouds too low may make it impossible to see a safe place to land, or even a paratrooper you are about to have a mid-air collision with. As you could imagine, the terrain in the area of the DZ has an effect on the jump. Too many trees to land in will get an airborne operation cancelled. Too much water in the area has the same effect as do power lines and interstate highways.
Upon viewing the full video myself, it seems the pathfinders actually went in at 4,000 m, not 5,000m as the original report I had read indicated. The men who jumped were not wearing any oxygen equipment and it appears to be a typical static line jump. The wiki on HALO seems to indicate it being used at altitudes above 7,600 m, so that particular aspect sounds reasonable.
After watching the video, I would have to say that cloud cover killed the jump. If you can’t see the ground from about 1000 feet above, it is not safe to jump. Also, I don’t know if this is related, but that river did not look like it would be a safe place to land, so that might have had something to do with it.
I feel for those paratroopers. Exiting an aircraft by the back ramp while it is on the ground is one of the worst feelings you can have.
All paratroopers crash into the ground. That is part of the plan. For that reason the airborne guys can jump in where the helicopters cannot safely fly in. Other than injuries to the troops, there is no reason why the soldiers could not have gone in.
But then again injuries to the troops are a factor, a big one.
In cruddy weather it is best to jump as low as possible. Elsewise the weather will scatter the drop all to heck. If everyone falls like a rock a short distance, they will all be at one (but perhaps wrong) place.
The missions seems to have gotten a bit too dangerous and the commander used his judgement to scrub the operation. No need to burden the area with more injured people. They got some trained people on the ground with commo, so now they can drop stuff into the area. How much additional good would a couple dozen more guys do?
Not airborne here, but that does sound right. The pathfinders would remain in contact with command and report on terrain and wind conditions encountered. A jump that can be handled by a team of experienced pathfinders in steerable “wing” chutes may not be a suitable drop for one to two hundred men in plain static-line “round chutes”. Eventually, command determined that it was not worth potentially adding more casualties to an already bad situation, as Paul says, and instead let the advance team establish communications and assist with coordinating future supply drops.
My original question has been answered, but in this case, I would venture that having a company instead of 15 is probably better - the terrain is very rough and there are probably many settlements in the hills and valleys, cut off from road access and probably with casualties from collapsed buildings. In this case, even 1 or 2 men with radios and what medical supplies they can carry are probably worth having. In this case, the difference would be having communications with one town versus having communications and a presence in the surrounding villages too - 100 men on the ground means you can send 10 men, a few rucks full of bandages and morphine and a radio each to 10 surrounding hill villages that may not be accessible to anything more than foot traffic.
That would be why Pathfinders are sent in first. These guys are trained in how to build a LZ, or a place to drop supplies. Some of those supplies may be medical equipment and food, or may be trucks. If you have to use your supplies treating your own casualties instead of using those same supplies to aid the people you were sent there to support, you have wasted those supplies.
Not sure if it makes any difference but IIRC the altititude of Wenchuan is at least 1,000 meters. It’s been 20 years since I was last there, but Wenchuan, which is where the epicenter hit, is already in steep hill country and far out of the plains. As I remember it, then you really start to climb. Peaks in the general vincinity are around 5,000 meters. So, it’s deep river valley’s, lots of trees and no flat farm land.
I watched the clip. Orignally, were going to drop in 4 destinations in the quake zone.