JohnWeiss

Here's a quote related to skydiving from the book "Blackhawk Down", page 276, about the firefight between Army Rangers and Somalia warlord Aidid's forces in Mogodishu. The scene: About 100 soldiers are pinned down inside the city as night falls. A rescue convoy force is sent in at night to reinforce the trapped soldiers and pull them out. Quote: "Specialist Steve Anderson was in a Humvee near Sizemore's in the column. He was in the back of the driver's side with his eyes pressed to the night-vision viewfinder on his SAW. Whenever the column stopped, which was often, everyone was expected to pile out and pull security. The first time they stopped Anderson hesitated. He didn't want to stick his legs out of the car. He had just started skydiving lessons at home before this deployment, and now, suddenly, he felt immobilized by the particular fear of being shot in the legs - he'd received a minor injury to his legs on an earlier mission. Back home he had just made his first freefall jump. It had been such a thrill. What if he got his foot shot off and could never jump again? Anderson relunctantly forced himself out on the street..." Even in the middle of an intense combat mission, he couldn't get skydiving out of his mind!

Oh, they'll be happy to pull you into a back room and sit and chat with you for hours. Just refuse to let them pat you down, and that'll give you plenty of time together to learn all about his parachute jump.