Load It, Carry It, Drop It - About Our Unit

We all work within the Joint Air Delivery Test & Evaluation Unit (JADTEU) which is located at RAF Brize Norton, near Oxford, and comprises 124 personnel (Royal Navy, Army, Royal Air Force and Civil Service) commanded by a Lieutenant Colonel.  (For those who might be interested, the Unit’s chain of command is through the Test & Evaluation Division of the RAF Air Warfare Centre which comes under Chief of Staff Operations at HQ Air Command.) 

What does JADTEU do?

Well, quite a lot really!  We must start with the obligatory Mission Statement (everyone has to have one these days!):

“To enable the delivery by air of manpower, machines and materiel through development, trials and training, in order to enhance Defence Capability.”

Whenever a new, redesigned, or damaged piece of equipment needs to be carried inside or slung under a Royal Air Force fixed wing or UK MOD rotary aircraft; there is only one establishment that can approve the load to be safe to fly.  That’s JADTEU.  Additionally, if anyone or anything is required to leave the aircraft during flight, (normally with a parachute attached but often just sliding down a rope) it has to come through us to prove its airworthiness and to determine the most appropriate way to do it.  The Unit enhances Defence Capability through the provision of Air Delivery expertise and advice, principally by the conduct of trials, evaluation and training in the following areas (starting with the most interesting and exciting!):

• Airborne Trials (ATS).  (That’s us!!)  We conduct trials of personnel parachutes and the ancillary equipment used in support of the airborne task.  As such, anything carried by, or strapped to, a UK military person parachuting from a fixed wing or rotary aircraft has to undergo trials to ensure its suitability for the task, and more importantly, to ensure it does not endanger the individual.

Working with several other agencies, we first conduct ground operational and evaluation tests to assess the suitability of the equipment; the equipment then enters a flight trial period to confirm its safe operation during a whole series of flight envelope parameters.  These include a number of despatch and operating procedures at varying aircraft speeds and various dropping heights which can be as low as 600 ft by static line (which is quite low!) up to 36,000 ft by free fall or static line (which is quite high – nearly 7 miles high to be precise!).

• Aerial Delivery (AD).  AD Section is responsible for designing load restraining procedures for aerial delivery platforms and providing despatch solutions for new to service equipment or redesigned aerial delivery systems for loads delivered from an aircraft by parachute.

• Airportability (AP).  AP Section develops solutions for the loading and restraint of equipment and materiel in fixed and rotary wing aircraft.

• Helicopter Section (Hels).  Hels is responsible for the assessment and trial of all equipment and materiel that is to be transported as underslung loads beneath UK military helicopters.

• Training Section.  This Section trials systems to enable rapid deployment of manpower into enclosed or hostile environments and provides the delivery of training to produce competent and qualified Helicopter Handling Instructors; Helicopter Abseil Instructors; Helicopter Fast Roping Instructors.

So, there you go – pretty cool, ay?  That’s what we get up to in our day job!