Landing without parachutes - Russian experience

You will be very surprised, dear members of the forum ATS, but these "crazy Russians" have experience of landing from aircraft without parachutes. I want to tell you about three such cases.

1. Landing operation in the Mozhaisk direction in November 1941.

At the climax of the Battle of Moscow in November 1941, an incredible incident occurred. It was described in his book "Prince's Island" by the Russian writer Yuri Sergeev. Having learned that a column of Germans - 54 tanks and infantry in trucks - was rapidly advancing towards the capital along the highway, the Soviet command decided to drop volunteers into the area. The fighters had to jump out of the planes on a low level flight across the tank column. Due to the urgency of preparation, the participants in the operation did not have time to issue parachutes. There were no parachutes available. The paratroopers, as Sergeev says, "in clusters" fell into deep snowdrifts in white sheepskin coats, terrifying the enemy. Immediately, they threw themselves under tanks with grenades and burned military equipment from anti-tank rifles. The victory remained with the Russians, the tank column was stopped, many tanks were burned, but as a result of unsuccessful jumps from a height, 12% of the paratroopers died.

It is noteworthy that this was not the only case of such a landing during the defense of Moscow. The story of a similar operation, only with heavy losses, can be found in the autobiographical book From Heaven to Battle, written by the Soviet intelligence officer Ivan Starchak, one of the parachute jumping champions.


2. Landing operation near Yelnya in the winter of 1942.

The German author Alkmar von Gove, based on the documents and memoirs of the Wehrmacht commanders, in his book "Attention, paratroopers" said that in the Red Army there really was a practice of landing without parachutes from a height of 5-10 meters into deep snowdrifts. Such a massive landing operation was carried out in the winter of 1942 near Yelnya.

On low level flight (height 15-20 meters), the planes flew over the fields and the paratroopers jumped straight into the deep snow, which softened the blows and most of the soldiers, without being injured, entered the battle. Von Gove wrote in his book:

"There are no words to express admiration for these guys - it was absolutely Russian, not repeated by anyone in the world, a method of landing. Slow-moving bombers descended over a snow-covered field to a low level flight, and the paratroopers jumped into the snow without parachutes! And immediately entered the battle! For all the tragedy of the situation in which our troops found themselves, I could not help but admire this courage and prowess, vividly reminiscent of the national Russian amusements - riding in troika. "

3. Jump without a parachute from a height of 3500 meters

In the battles on the Leningrad Front, the legendary letik Vladimir Murzaev served on a twin-engine long-range bomber. On one of the missions, his low-speed aircraft was left without fighter cover and was shot down by the German Messerschmidt. Murzaev jumped out of the plane, but received a blow to the head and lost consciousness. The pilot woke up in a deep snowdrift not far from his airfield.

Vladimir got to the airfield, went into the commander's barrack and threw his parachute onto the bench. The parachute turned out to be aplomb. It turns out that Murzaev was hit on the head with a part of the plane's skin, but did not open the parachute.
The fall from 3500 meters was softened by snowdrifts and true soldier's luck.

And as a bonus, dear members of the forum, I want to show you a video of a unique landing from a height of 10,000 meters in the Arctic of Russian paratroopers.



Thank.

a reply to: RussianTroll

Bit like drinking tea without screening it. Now thats jumping without a parachute.

a reply to: RussianTroll

This practice was humorously referred to as "LANO" in the U.S. forces. LANO = Low Altitude, No Opening. A wordplay on the term HALO.

The operations you describe sound very desperate. But even with normal drops, paratroopers took heavy casualties across all the armies.

Cheers

I can see that working and the Russians doing it. The important part is it worked.

A stewardess survived falling from an airliner. A Russian airliner.

link

The toughness of the Russian people will never be disputed.

a reply to: CthruU

This is probably a very strong drive

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

Do you know this practice? Please share.

a reply to: beyondknowledge

Wow that 33,000 ft fall got her into Guiness Book Of World Records. I bet that record goes challenged for many many years.

And these guys bailing out of planes on purpose to protect Russia without parachutes is very courageous RussianTroll.

a reply to: RussianTroll

Ouch!, that took some gut's and yet it worked, then again remember how few Gun's the Russian soldiers had when Russia was in it's darkest day's, they ran at machine gun nests in human waves stepping over the body's of there fallen comrades and picking up any gun's they saw, through sheer numbers they overwhelmed the German army.

By the end of the war the Germans had devised the STG 44 the first Assault rifle, like many thing's German it was too little too late and over engineered so prone to jamming and other issues but the principle born out of the German's sheer terror at the human wave attack's went on to give rise to both the AK-47 and the M16 assault rifles.

Yes the commissars with there own machine gun's and PPSH would have shot them had they refused to charge those machine gun's BUT that too took great courage, knowing you are facing almost certain death probably made these men even more determined to drive the Germans from there land.

My uncle Alfred was only a small man with a slight build, just 5' tall, lied about his age and was in Burma fighting the Japanese, he jumped into a trench and killed several Japanese soldiers in hand to hand combat, was bayonetted in his side and also caught Malaria, he had fits after the war in which he would relive his experiences and think he was back there, he would shout deliriously "He's in the Tree, get him, get the little Yellow bastard he's in the Tree", I don't know the context of what he was reliving but it sound's like he must have spotted a sniper at some point.

There are many story's on all sides from the second world war of great heroism and self sacrifice, because they were undoubtedly the evil side we don't know the many story's that the Germans must have had but remember despite being drugged up to there eyeball's on Pervatin (Crystal meth to the rest of us) and acting like inhuman animals to everyone that was not German they too were human being's as were the Japanese whom would rather die than fail in there duty so would often make suicide attacks.

In the end the right people won that worst conflict in known history but at great cost, but you must remember that Soviet Russia actually entered the war on the side of Germany before Hitler turned on them, they both invaded Poland and divided it between them and it was because of Poland that France and Britain went to war with Germany (or else eventually Hitler would have attacked Russia first had we not wanted him to let go of Poland).

Did you know also that before the War (1930's) NAZI representatives were on fairly friendly terms with the Soviets (despite Hitler's speeches in which he condemned communism) and had observers whom were allowed to see how the Soviet's disposed of there dissident's and other so called enemy's of the people, by machine gunning them into trenches they had been forced to dig themselves, by working them to death in gulag's and when the German's tried to use these techniques themselves they found it was expensive to kill people because bullets cost money so they started to develop there own murder system, death Van's eventually became gas chambers.

originally posted by: RussianTroll
a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

Do you know this practice? Please share.

Hi RT,

Sorry, don't understand. Do you mean, have I done a HALO jump? No, I have not. Had a bunch of friends who were paratroopers. The conversations were interesting. That is where I heard "LANO" as a "word".

No, my only experience with a parachute was being tied to a boat while wearing a parachute (parasailing). It was a nice ride up there, and the boat crew brought us down very gently.

Cheers

a reply to: LABTECH767

My friend, you are captivated by the historical myths that have been created recently. There was the heroism of ordinary soldiers in every army. But the desire to discredit Russia now prevails in the West over historical justice.

Poland received land as a result of the destruction of the Russian Empire. It is a shame to boast when you steal from a neighbor, when you are strong, and at the same time cry when a neighbor takes his by force, when he recovers his strength. Russians always come for their money.

Germany's path to the conquest of Europe was opened by the Munich Agreement, and not the German-Russian non-aggression pact, which was the last among similar pacts between Germany and European countries. Think of Czechoslovakia and Austria.

The myths about the NKVD detachments with machine guns were launched by Western intelligence services to discredit the USSR. Yes, the dither were shot, but that was the norm in the war of all armies. There were no machine gunners behind the fighters. It's fake.

The dissidents in the USSR were the descendants of rabid Trotskyist revolutionaries who dreamed of destroying power, any power, for the sake of a world revolution. The state must be able to defend itself, otherwise there will be no states or peoples, only sheer terror. Stalin did everything right. If Trump had been placed at that time, he would have been Stalin.

Thanks for the answer. I'm always ready for a constructive dialogue)))

a reply to: RussianTroll

There were no machine gunners behind the fighters. It's fake.

The "punishment" companies / battalions -did- employ "machine gun encouragement" , but yes, I'm fairly certain that was not standard practice throughout the Soviet Army.

The Germans employed "punishment" units as well. And Wehrmacht discipline was ferocious.

Cheers

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

A friend of mine. We did not understand each other. I didn't understand what HALO is, I'm sorry.

I have never jumped with a parachute, only dreamed, all my life. Maybe someday I'll jump. It will be when the other problems in life are over and I can go about my desires. Most likely - never))))

originally posted by: RussianTroll
a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

A friend of mine. We did not understand each other. I didn't understand what HALO is, I'm sorry.

I have never jumped with a parachute, only dreamed, all my life. Maybe someday I'll jump. It will be when the other problems in life are over and I can go about my desires. Most likely - never))))

HALO = High Altitude, Low Opening. Special operations technique.

Cheers

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

War in general is a terrible, disgusting and terrible thing. Anything can happen in war, sweat, dirt, blood, torment and suffering. My friends went through this in Ukraine, where Russians are killing Russians on orders from the West. I was too old to fight for the Russians there, I worked in the information field.
In any case, it is better to live in peace, be friends and help each other. Death to all politicians.

a reply to: RussianTroll

Ahh I did not know that bit of history, so that land was actually Russian and in dispute but how long before, I know that in Ukraine the pro Nazi faction there were murdering Ukrainian Polish so the poles were quite widely spread out at one time or another into several areas that may have been part of other nation's.

I suspect that would be a point of nationalist pride on both sides of that debate and I am not qualified or vested in either side of that debate.

Thank you for that correction.

I still think that Stalin went too far and was almost as bad as Hitler however, the man was a paranoid whom expected to be knifed and slept on the couch and then there is the whole story of how he threatened Lenin's wife in order to force Lenin to name him as his successor but how true or propagandist that is?.

A lot of completely innocent people did die during Stalin's purges which often resembled medieval witch hunt's with people being taken away simply because they had been denounced often for other reason's jealousy included and also when men whom perhaps should not have been given power such as regional party members abused that power to settle old scores.

That said the world was doomed to enter a very dark place one Hitler gained power and had Russia had a weaker leader just maybe our world would be a very bad place today, someone had to oppose the German's.

If you look back at the propaganda of the time even in the US they had started to call Stalin Uncle Joe but after the war was over the ideology's of both sides drew them immediately back apart.

a reply to: LABTECH767

Those lands have shifted between "owners" for centuries. Poland was once a big deal in Lithuania and Ukraine. Then Poland grew weak and was partitioned between Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Rose up again in 1918 and managed to grab some of the contested regions again, followed by 1939 and all that.

What is different today is that the policies of Hitler and Stalin changed the ethnic composition of those lands very dramatically.

Cheers

a reply to: RussianTroll

HALO stands for "high altitude low opening" where the person exits a plane at very high elevation and waiting until the last possible moment to open the parachute without the drop causing injury. In this manner you can avoid observation better...not sure if radars pick up parachutes but if they do it would also help not being detected there too.

a reply to: RussianTroll

Not sure which I would have rather done...jump 3 stories into the snow at like 100mph or run into battle with only a handful of ammo to wait for my turn with the squads only rifle lol...

a reply to: LABTECH767

My friend, this is a very difficult question that requires a very long factual discussion. In fact, many more Germans died in the Eisenhower camps than in Stalin's captivity. You can also remember the camps for Japanese, US citizens, in America. You can remember a lot.

As an Orthodox person, I cannot forgive Stalin for the repression of my Church, the destruction of Temples and the murder of Orthodox priests. But it's not that simple. In the end, Stalin was killed by the Trotskyists led by Khrushchev, that is, he did not control everything in the country. Remember, in 1917 all communist adventurers from all over the world, including America, arrived in Russia. And they took key positions in the Soviet state. Stalin fought them all his life.

In any case, this is the history of my country. I will not demolish monuments to Stalin and Lenin, repent and kneel. I accept and love my country, its history, always and everywhere. What I wish for you, friends.

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

Poles are the same Slavs as Russians. They were the first to be catholicized by the Roman Catholic Church. And the whole history of Poland is a struggle of Catholic neophytes with their past - Russian Orthodoxy. The same applies to Lithuania.