"Энди Макнаб. Кризис четвертого (engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

Technology is wonderful. We were traveling at about thirty-five knots;
the canopy gives you twenty knots, and we were running with the wind, which
was fifteen.
I checked my height-just over twenty-eight grand-good. Checked the sat
nav, good. That was it. Everything was done: the oxygen was working, we were
stacked. Time to get comfy. I got hold of the risers that attached the
canopy to the rig, and pulled myself up and wiggled my legs to move the leg
straps halfway down my thighs.
For the next thirty minutes we minced along the sky, controlling the
rig, checking height and the sat nav. I started to see lights now. Small
towns and villages with streetlights following the roads out of the built-up
areas for about half a mile, then darkness, only car lights giving away the
road.
I looked at my alti. I was about 16,200 feet. I thought, I'll just go
for a few more minutes and I'll take my oxygen mask off. The fucking thing
was a pain in the ass. If I started feeling the effects of hypoxia
dizziness, I'd bring the mask back to my face and take a couple of deep
breaths. By now I was just under 16 grand; my mouth was full of saliva and
it felt all clammy. I got hold of the clip with my right hand and pulled the
press stud off, and the thing just fell down and dangled by the left-hand
side of my face.
I could feel the cold around my mouth where all the moisture from the
mask had been. I was freezing, but it was nice; I could stretch my mouth and
chew my jaw around a bit.
After about ten minutes I checked my alti again: 6,500 feet, time to
start working. I put on my NVGs (night viewing goggles), which had been
hanging around my neck on para cord and started looking for the flash on an
IR Firefly (infrared detecting system). It was the same flashing light that
you would expect to see on the top of a tall tower to warn aircraft, but
these are just little handheld things that throw out a brilliant quick flash
of light, through an IR filter. No one would see it apart from us-or anyone
else with NVG, of course. I kept looking in the darkness. It would be easy
to pick out. Bang-there it was to my half right.
We were coming in on finals. I was concentrating on keeping myself
positioned right on top and to the rear of Reg 1 's canopy, which was larger
than mine as he had the extra weight to jump with. I heard him below me
sounding like a nursery-school teacher.
"Right, any minute now. Keep your legs bent and under your hips. Are
your legs bent?"
She must have acknowledged. I pulled the NVGs off my face and let them
hang.
"OK, put your hands up by me." I imagined her with her hands up,
holding Reg 1 's wrists on the brake lines to keep them out of the way so
she didn't damage herself if they took a bad landing.
I couldn't see any ground yet-it was far too dark-but I heard:
"Standby, standby. Flaring soon ... flaring ... flaring ..."
Then the sound of his bergen thumping into the ground, and his command
to Sarah: "Now!"
His canopy started to collapse below me as I flew past. My bergen was
dangling by the straps from my feet; I kicked it off and it fell beneath me