"In the good old days of mid sixties, in the good ol' Czechoslovakia, we used to jump sideways from some clapped out Russian plane ( Iljushin, I think), and, once out of modern then turbo prop Il 12. Helmets we did no wear, only leather cowls, no body armour and about 25% of body weight in various gear and armaments, plus a radio, only with the operator, but then we had boxes of ammo stuck under our asses. I guess we were meant to live more than fifteen to twenty minutes after discovery. The jumps were fun but the two or so minutes to the ground did not really pay for the slog of many hours afterwards. We were pretty hard mob then, even though serving in National Service. I still have some fond memories of those times."