Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Crystal Harlow | Jumpmasters from Indonesia are led through aircraft orientation Dec. 3, 2014, in...... read more read more
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By Sgt. Crystal Milton
220th Public Affairs Detachment
FORT BRAGG, N.C. — Jumpmasters have come from near and far to participate in the 17th Annual Randy Older Memorial Operation Toy Drop, but before anyone goes airborne, U.S. jumpmasters must be assured that everyone is on the same page.
Jumpmasters from Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Indonesia, Latvia and Italy joined U.S. Soldiers here for Operation Toy Drop, a U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command (Airborne) sponsored training event that also includes collecting toys to distribute to thousands of local children for Christmas.
This event is currently the world’s largest combined airborne operation with more than 4,000 troops participating.
All of the allied jumpmasters and U.S. jumpmasters conducted aircraft orientation on mock C-130 aircraft and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters Dec. 3 and Dec. 4, 2014.
“The purpose of aircraft orientation is for jumpmasters to get used to working around the aircraft,” said Sgt. Cecilia Poland, whose hometown is Joliet, Illinois and who is a parachute rigger with the 824th Quartermaster Company here. “For us jumpmasters, it helps us practice what moves and what hazards we need to look for during an airborne operation,” she added.
Jumpmasters entered the mock aircrafts with other troops from their nation and performed most of the steps in their native languages.
Paolo Pastorino, a retired commander and paratrooper from Milano, Italy, stated his reason for wanting to participate in this exercise was to “join in [on] a very important operation that is very well known abroad, where we can have a strong connection between the civilian world outside and the military world inside, and not to mention the fact that this is a charity operation.”
Pastorino, who has been jumping since 1978, has more than 120 jumps under his belt, and acquired his U.S. jump wings when he jumped with American Soldiers in Germany in 1994.
Pastorino recalled the times he spent with U.S. Soldiers in the past and reflected on his experience here with all the partner nations and said warmly, “to see that it doesn’t matter what kind of uniform we have, it doesn’t matter what language we speak — the soul and the heart is the same, it doesn’t matter the nationality.”
“I’m so happy to be here--I’m so proud to be here,” Pastorino added.
“We learned the U.S. Military paratroopers way [of performing jumps] and maybe the good things we can adopt in our country,” said 1st Lt. Ajie Purbaya, whose hometown is Bandung, Indonesia and who is the support company commander of the 502nd Airborne Battalion in Malang, East Java.
Purbaya, who is participating in this exercise for the first time, has been a paratrooper since 2006 and has jumped more than 35 times.
“Jumpmasters do rehearsals until the primary jumpmaster is satisfied,” said Master Sgt. Dwight Simon, whose hometown is Johnstown, Pennsylvania and who is the senior human resources sergeant at Headquarters and Headquarters Company USACAPOC(A) here and one of the jumpmasters for this event.
“Between the U.S. aircraft orientation and our aircraft orientation there are slight differences but the basic things are the same – we have to ensure the safety of the paratroopers jumping,” Purbaya added.
| Date Taken: | 12.03.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 12.05.2014 18:30 |
| Story ID: | 149549 |
| Location: | FORT BRAGG, NORTH CAROLINA, US |
| Hometown: | JOHNSTOWN, PENNSYLVANIA, US |
| Web Views: | 272 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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