FRIDAY FOTO (September 13, 2019)

Wet Silk Training

(U.S. Army photo by Specialist Christopher Stevenson)

A soldier emerges through a parachute canopy during wet silk training at Fort Carson, Colorado on September 6, 2019.

Wet silk training? It sounds so … unmilitary. Here at 4GWAR Blog, we have to admit, we had never heard the term before. The Defense Department caption that came with this photo noted wet silk training is designed to prepare Army Special Operations personnel (Green Berets and Rangers) for airborne water jumps.

Here’s the thing, parachuting out of an airplane or high-flying helicopter is daunting enough, but landing in water can be scary — especially when you swim to the surface and come up under your soggy parachute. “When you are swimming under a wet parachute, it sticks to your face and your body, and it is a very uncomfortable feeling,” Sergeant 1st Class Michael Donahue, told the author of an Army Special Operations Command public affairs article in 2014. “It’s very uncomfortable if you have never done it before,” added Donahue, who, at the time, was coaching water survival training at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

Training is conducted in swimming pools with lots of safety personnel and equipment around, including flotation devices to keep the sodden training parachute afloat, which accounts for the weird swirling colors in today’s FRIFO.