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Canadian jumpers top international competition
RHODE ISLAND (USA)—Canadians took top honours at an international military accuracy parachute competition in August.
Forty-two teams from around the world participated, including Italy, England, Poland, South Africa, Tunisia, El Salvador, Ecuador, Germany, Jordan, Thailand, Canada and the United States.
Two teams from A Company, 3rd Battalion, Royal 22 e Régiment took part in the 20th annual Leapfest, organized by 56th Troop Command, Army National Guard.
MCpl François Ranger ’s team took home the team championship — and the best foreign team title — with a time of 237 seconds. The American 121st Infantry team (257 seconds)and 20th Special Forces team (277 seconds) finished second and third respectively.
Cpl Michel Dufour won the individual champion title, as well as best foreign parachutist, with a time of 22 seconds from three jumps, defeating two Americans, who clocked 24 and 26 seconds respectively.
Sgt Mazet is the Parachute Operations Sergeant for 3 R22 e R.
NOTE:
Visit the U.S. Army's "ArmyLink News" to see the article written by Master Sgt. Bob Haskell who is a senior correspondent for the National Guard Bureau. Here is the link:
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http://www.dnd.ca/menu/Feature_Story/20 ... 02_f_e.htm
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Canadians jump ahead of U.S. airborne in `Leapfest'
by Master Sgt. Bob Haskell
WEST KINGSTON, R.I. (Army News Service, Aug. 23, 2002) - Royal Canadian paratroopers bested a field of 42 teams from 12 nations here Aug. 17 in Leapfest, the International Military Parachute Competition.
Leapfest is the only event like it in the world, organizers said, and it is put on every August by the Rhode Island Army National Guard.
One of the two teams from the 3rd Battalion Royal 22nd Regiment Parachute Company in Quebec took home the team championship, Canada's first. And Cpl. J.P.A.M. Dufour from that outfit was the individual champion.
Army Guard teams from Georgia's 121st Infantry and Maryland's 20th Special Forces Group finished second and third on the sweltering Saturday when the heat index climbed to an estimated 103 degrees.
Army Sgt. 1st Class Charles Skipper from the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, N.C., finished second, and Kentucky Army Guard Lt. Col. Wayne Burd took third in the individual competiton. They were among the 168 parachutists who dropped off the back ramps of four CH-47 "Chinook" helicopters from the Pennsylvania Army Guard as if they were jumping into a swimming pool.
Leapfest turned 20 this year, and word has gotten around among the international airborne brotherhood that West Kingston, R.I. is the place to be in August.
"A lot of German airborne soldiers want to come here," said Capt. Andreas Von Weihe of the German Army's 31st Airborne Brigade on Aug. 17 while taking part for the first time in Leapfest.
Fifteen of the teams came from 11 foreign countries. It was the largest international turnout in the event's history.
Thailand sent a Royal Air Force special operations team half way around the world. Other teams came from South Africa and Tunisia, Ecuador and El Salvador. Poland participated for the first time. So did Jordan. The United Kingdom sent two teams from its reserve Territorial Army. Three Canadian teams jumped.
"This is what we hoped this would grow to. We wanted to foster these relations with the international teams," said retired Maj. Gen. N. Andre Trudeau who helped bring Leapfest to life in 1982.
The rules are fairly simple for the single-day event that is open to military qualified parachutists.
"It takes me back to my days in jump school at Fort Benning, Ga., in 1964," said retired Rhode Island resident Dan Thompson, a 10-year Navy veteran, while observing that Saturday's total of 500 jumps.
"Watching them float down reminded me of how much I liked it," added Thompson who jumped 158 times.
The floating is the easy part for the competitive airborne troopers.
Each four-member team jumps three times from 1,500 feet with static lines that pull the chutes open. The parachutists land as close as they can to a large orange X in the middle of a manicured, 218-acre drop zone on a farm where turf for golf courses is grown. They are timed from the moment they touch the ground until they touch the X - while dragging their chutes. The individuals and teams with the lowest total times win.
Working the wind and maneuvering the chutes to land close to the target are keys to success. If they land in the trees? Fagetaboutit.
"The wind can be a real problem, especially if you land down wind from the target and have to drag your chute back to it," pointed out Sgt. 1st Class Bob Perry, this year's chief judge who has jumped in or worked on all 20 Leapfests.
The top team's name gets inscribed on the Rhode Island Adjutant General's International Parachute Trophy.
Teams from three American units have won twice - Company F, 425th Rangers; Company G, 509th Infantry; and the129th Long Range Surveillance Detachment. Four different teams from the 82nd Airborne Division have won.
A team from Tunisia won in 1994. United Kingdom paratroopers won in '94. A German team won in 2000. Canada took home the bacon this year.
There were two new twists to this year's Leapfest, according to the Rhode Islanders versed in its history.
Pennsylvania Army Guard Staff Sgt. Benjamin Gomez, from the 104th Infantry Detachment, became the first Leapfest competitor to ever land on the orange X. His time for that particular jump was zero.
Air Guard Maj. Gen. William Lynch, Pennsylvania's adjutant general, became the first general officer to compete in the event. Other generals have made ceremonial jumps, it was explained, but Lynch was the first to jump three times as the member of a team.
The international team members are pinned with U.S. parachutist wings. That courtesy is common within the international airborne culture. Perry, for example, earned Thailand's "balloon wings" during his Special Forces days by parachuting from a dirigible that was tethered at 800 feet.
The bonding that the paratroopers from the different lands experience during the week or two they are together in Rhode Island is considered as important as the competition. "The big thing is the camaraderie," said South African Maj. Johan Joubert, an army reservist who competed in his third Leapfest. "It was interesting to meet the people from the South American countries - Ecuador and El Salvador. There is no other way we could have met them. Until now, their countries have been places on the map."
The four members of the South African team, all reservists, paid their own airfare, added Joubert, a civil engineer. That's how much they like Leapfest.
The Rhode Island hospitality includes a trip to nearby Boston for a Red Sox game and the chance to buy jeans at local outlet stores for considerably less money than they cost in Europe.
Whatever pressure the parachutists feel is self-imposed.
"This competition is one of the few times these paratroopers can have a good time without being pushed to set up a defensive perimeter in the woods after they've jumped," said Perry. "It's a fun situation."
Royal Thailand Air Force Lt. Phiphukdee Vinit agreed.
"This is the first time I have had this kind of competition in my life. It is the same for my team," said the 17-year military veteran who has been parachuting for a decade. "This Leapfest is a very excellent experience."
(Editor's note: Master Sgt. Bob Haskell is a senior correspondent for the National Guard Bureau.)
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http://www.dtic.mil/armylink/news/Aug20 ... pfest.html M16:
Canadian jumpers top international competition
Canadian jumpers top international competition -
10-07-2002, 12:46 PM
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