EJECT EJECT EJECT

That what you said before you ejected out of an airplane.

The second phase of pilot training was learning to fly the T-37 twin engine Cessna jet.  The T-37 (affectionately called "The Tweet") had ejection seats, so we had to learn to parachute before we could fly the airplane.  

There was a real seat that we all strapped into and had to pull the ejection levers.  Boom!  You were basically sitting on a 10 gauge shotgun shell with only a steel plate and an old foam cushion protecting you.  It was a violent acceleration up the ejection rail and a fairly gentle stop.  Someone got a great photo of Jimmy Huard just as the seat blasted off with him in it... I have that photo somewhere... His face was all distorted by the G-Forces.

There is another photo of Jimmy on his back, being dragged down a dirt road by a pick up truck... the object was to get out of your parachute harness before you got killed!  He purposely didn't disconnect right away so he could scream and holler for effect.  I remember laughing hard.

Then there was parasailing.  Not like you have seen at the beach.  We were bussed out to some ranch where there was a pickup truck with a very long rope attached to it. There needed to be a little wind for this to all work... which is never a problem in West Texas. The rope was attached to your parachute harness and your buddies held your parachute open so it could inflate in the wind.  When the parachute was all inflated behind you, the truck would take off and you had to run or you would be dragged down the dirt road on your face... more than one guy did that.

I was airborne in about 5 steps and they took me up to about 100' and then they slowed down to try to give me a gentle landing.  The wind gusted at the last moment and I ended up landing flat footed... a no no. I jammed my back but I didn't tell anyone... I wanted to fly airplanes.  

My back was a problem after that and I slept on the floor for months until pain went away. The preflight on the Tweet required the student to duck walk under the airplane to pull the landing gear safety pins our so the landing gear would retract on takeoff.  I had to crawl on all fours to get under there and get them... Thankfully I was never questioned on that.

My roommate washed out of pilot training right about this time.  He was a smart guy and had a 4.0 in college, but he always fell for the trick questions on our exams.  I spent countless hours trying to teach him about trick questions and help him study.  I had nick-named him "Mama Hutz".  He was a very kind gentle man who like to help others.  It was very sad to see "Mama Hutz" go.  He ended up in a missile silo way up north somewhere... everyone studied way harder after that.