The Reaper: Autobiography of One of the Deadliest Special Ops Snipers by Gary Brozek, Nicholas Irving Page A
Authors: Gary Brozek, Nicholas Irving
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doctors had told me. I don’t know why the RICE acronym stuck with me. Rest. Ice. Compression. Elevation. I performed each of those religiously, substituting my low-impact work for complete rest.
I did all the physical training tests and was worried about the two-mile run, but I managed to get through it basically pain-free in thirteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds. I’m glad I didn’t cave in to the pressure, otherwise I would have just continued to do damage to my body, and who knows what might have happened if my shins hadn’t gotten better. Airborne school, of course, meant facing my biggest fear. Even though the mock AC-130 tower was only forty feet high and you’re in a harness and all, letting go and getting into that tucked-in position was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do. I got a bad case of the shakes but I’d gotten up there by not looking down and just staring at the back of the guy in front of me.
That’s a principle that I followed through most of my training. Don’t think. Do as you’re told. Eventually fear gives way. I was fortunate in that high winds were whipping up for the whole three weeks of airborne so we never went up on the two-hundred-fifty-foot tower, just the mock-up.
Be careful what you wish for. Not going through that next phase meant that the next time we jumped, it was going to be for real.
I’m trying to think of a word for how terrible it was. It was intense. I was a big adrenaline junkie, or at least I thought I was until that day. We got rigged up, and my parachute was good. My reserve parachute was fine. My helmet was fine. Going to the aircraft, the AC-130, I was walking out to the airfield, we were in two lines. I was in the first chalk and the second chalk was off to my right. I was walking up in the line when one of the airborne instructors, a female, pulled me off to the side. I thought I was in trouble or something. I was sitting there thinking, What’s going on? Then I heard the words I was dreading.
“You’re going to be the first one to exit.”
She put me at the end of the line. I think she knew I had a fear of heights because she was with me on the tower and she saw the way I was acting. She put me at the very back of the line, the rest all filed in, and there I was, the first guy.
We got the one-minute call, the door came up, and we were already hooked up to the cable that stretched inside the length of the plane. This woman stood there, looked out, inspected everything on the outside of the aircraft, made sure there was nothing beneath us, the walkway was clear, all that good stuff. She pulled me up and handed me over to another airborne instructor, a guy. He held onto my back and he tiptoed me to the very, very edge of the aircraft.
I remember watching movies as a kid. I always thought that when you opened the door on an aircraft while it’s up in the sky, you’d get sucked out. Not the case. It was extremely loud. The wind was howling. I was getting thrown around. The aircraft was shaking somewhat. And it was kind of hard to keep my balance. That’s why there’s a grip on the back of your parachute. The instructor was holding me there and I was partially hanging out of the aircraft and we were going maybe a hundred fifty to two hundred miles an hour. And that wind was just pushing me, pushing me, pushing me, and I was standing there with nearly every one of my muscles in spasm, and the instructors say, “Don’t look down, just keep your eyes on the horizon.”
I started getting weak in the knees again and I remember thinking, What did I sign up for? This is ridiculous. I’m jumping out of an aircraft for no reason at all.
As I stood there, from my peripheral vision I could see to my right a red light, a yellow light, and a green light. The red light was holding steady. They called thirty seconds when the yellow light came on. And that’s when I thought, Oh, my gosh. This is really happening. The green light came on and the
I did all the physical training tests and was worried about the two-mile run, but I managed to get through it basically pain-free in thirteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds. I’m glad I didn’t cave in to the pressure, otherwise I would have just continued to do damage to my body, and who knows what might have happened if my shins hadn’t gotten better. Airborne school, of course, meant facing my biggest fear. Even though the mock AC-130 tower was only forty feet high and you’re in a harness and all, letting go and getting into that tucked-in position was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do. I got a bad case of the shakes but I’d gotten up there by not looking down and just staring at the back of the guy in front of me.
That’s a principle that I followed through most of my training. Don’t think. Do as you’re told. Eventually fear gives way. I was fortunate in that high winds were whipping up for the whole three weeks of airborne so we never went up on the two-hundred-fifty-foot tower, just the mock-up.
Be careful what you wish for. Not going through that next phase meant that the next time we jumped, it was going to be for real.
I’m trying to think of a word for how terrible it was. It was intense. I was a big adrenaline junkie, or at least I thought I was until that day. We got rigged up, and my parachute was good. My reserve parachute was fine. My helmet was fine. Going to the aircraft, the AC-130, I was walking out to the airfield, we were in two lines. I was in the first chalk and the second chalk was off to my right. I was walking up in the line when one of the airborne instructors, a female, pulled me off to the side. I thought I was in trouble or something. I was sitting there thinking, What’s going on? Then I heard the words I was dreading.
“You’re going to be the first one to exit.”
She put me at the end of the line. I think she knew I had a fear of heights because she was with me on the tower and she saw the way I was acting. She put me at the very back of the line, the rest all filed in, and there I was, the first guy.
We got the one-minute call, the door came up, and we were already hooked up to the cable that stretched inside the length of the plane. This woman stood there, looked out, inspected everything on the outside of the aircraft, made sure there was nothing beneath us, the walkway was clear, all that good stuff. She pulled me up and handed me over to another airborne instructor, a guy. He held onto my back and he tiptoed me to the very, very edge of the aircraft.
I remember watching movies as a kid. I always thought that when you opened the door on an aircraft while it’s up in the sky, you’d get sucked out. Not the case. It was extremely loud. The wind was howling. I was getting thrown around. The aircraft was shaking somewhat. And it was kind of hard to keep my balance. That’s why there’s a grip on the back of your parachute. The instructor was holding me there and I was partially hanging out of the aircraft and we were going maybe a hundred fifty to two hundred miles an hour. And that wind was just pushing me, pushing me, pushing me, and I was standing there with nearly every one of my muscles in spasm, and the instructors say, “Don’t look down, just keep your eyes on the horizon.”
I started getting weak in the knees again and I remember thinking, What did I sign up for? This is ridiculous. I’m jumping out of an aircraft for no reason at all.
As I stood there, from my peripheral vision I could see to my right a red light, a yellow light, and a green light. The red light was holding steady. They called thirty seconds when the yellow light came on. And that’s when I thought, Oh, my gosh. This is really happening. The green light came on and the
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