El Sparko Diablo's Pictures

El Sparko Diablo's Picture Page
We'll, You asked for it! SO many of you out there wanted to see some more pictures of me that I finally gave in. Here are some more pictures from when I was in the Army. As you can tell, each one is captioned to tell you what was cool about that situation!

Sparky in a TAPP Suit

This picture was taken in December of 1992, while I was stationed in South Korea. No, I am not wearing a Full Body Condom. Me, and my two friends had all just completed taking the EOD Suit Test, also known as the "TAP suit Challenge." TAP stands for Toxicological Agent Protective apparrel. Essenstially it is a full body condom, but this thing keeps out all of those nasty chemical warfare agents like sarin, mustard gas, and the other wonderful chemical goodies that nations use to make soldier's day less bright. See how tired we look? Thats because You have to run around in that suit for the maximum time allowed (determined by outdoor temps) while fully covered, breathing through a protective mask that passes air like damp cardboard. Since the temperature was about -2 F that day, we were in the suits for a while. What you can't see is that we are wearing 3 layers of protective coveralls in addition to the big, green, Gumby suit. You don't have to worry about being cold in that thing, even when you are standing still.
We lost some serious water weight that day.

Sparky and the Land Mine
This one is of me working on an antitank mine. You can see my personal weapon off to the right, the M-16/M203 combo. I know, my hands are not camoflaged too, but that is because I took off my gloves to work on the mine. In case you were wondering, that mine can kill an Abrams Main Battle Tank, lotsa power in a small package. The newer ones are even smaller......

Jumpers.....HIT IT! 1 Thousand...2 Thousand....

Here is one that I took right after being dumped out of a C-130 at 1000 feet.
My chute had just opened, and this is what I saw... Pretty cool huh?
No I was not in my proper descent position, but hey, my chute had opened so I had some time to kill. If you look real hard, you can see the C-130 as it is flying away, spilling out more troops.

On the road again.....

This one is of me right before my unit deployed to Puerto Rico for Ocean Venture 93. Notice the fresh tattoo, I had gotton it two days before.
The pile of rucksacks is covered with a cargo net,
so that it can be palletized for transport on an Air Force Bird. This was one of the few times that I got on an aircraft and landed in it as well.

This one is before we had a jump on a particularly cold day on Scenic Ft.Bragg. That is me under the camouflage blanket, aka the Pocho Liner or Combat Wubbie. We are aboard another C-130, on the way to somewhere.

No PICTURES!!!!! Where are the parachutes? They are on a pallet in the back of the plane. We rigged up while in flight for that jump, which is not real fun when the pilot thinks that he is flying a fighter and is trying to hug the ground. Ever see a 200 pound man wearing 300 pounds of equipment rise off the floor when the aircraft dives suddenly?
Not fun to experience, especially when it slams back up in a second.

This page was last modified on Friday, January 23, 1998
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