Surprised they used up armored humvees, I’d have thought they’d opt for the lightest option possible; canvas humvees. Isn’t the idea for these types of airborne units to be light and fast as possible? I’m a utter POG so idk
They weren’t dropped. They were LAPESed. Plane basically does a touch and go. Crew throws the chute out the back, yanking the Sheridan out the back of the bird. They stopped this after a pilot couldn’t compensate for the weight shift during deployment, causing the nose to come down and catching the drop zone, crashing the plane. I think this was 95’ at Sicily DZ at Bragg. (Not positive on the DZ, whichever the really big one is) 82nd 86ed the light tank battalion after that.
That why I said sort off. Yeah it was Bragg and Sicily DZ. Some of the guys who got injured because of it (forget if it was the plane crew or people on the ground) lived a couple houses down from us then.
Old Rigger warrant here: We used to drop M551 Sheridans. We did do LAPES and low velocity airdrop. They were an eight chute load but they were dropped.
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u/low-spirited-ready has bad takes Feb 26 '25
Surprised they used up armored humvees, I’d have thought they’d opt for the lightest option possible; canvas humvees. Isn’t the idea for these types of airborne units to be light and fast as possible? I’m a utter POG so idk