Parachute

 This article was originally written in the December 2023 issue of Manufacturing Today.  You can see the original article here. Capewell Aerial Systems (Capewell) is a 142-year-old manufacturing company firmly based in the defense sector. Back when Horses were critical to mobility, George J. Capewell began his business as an innovator in the mass production […]

Here at Capewell we occasionally get requests for specific information about the hardware we design and manufacture. One of the most common requests comes from military students seeking an advanced understanding of the parachute hardware they will soon be responsible for. Though we’re always happy to speak with our customers, we thought putting some of […]

The Mystery of the Color-Changing Capewell! This is another question we get all the time and lucky for you it has a very simple answer. Here you see a photo of a Capewell Parachute Release in the open position. The part highlighted in gold is a component aptly named the slider because it slides up […]

In honor of the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots this article will focus on a similar group of elite firefighters, the Smokejumpers! WHAT IS A SMOKEJUMPER? A smokejumper is a wildland firefighter who parachutes into rugged terrain to combat wildfires. By parachuting into fire zones, smokejumpers are able to combat fires in remote areas unreachable by other […]

In late June of 1940, the US War Department finally followed suit of many other countries and created an Airborne Infantry “Test Platoon” at Fort Benning, GA. This test platoon was composed of 2 officers and 48 enlisted soldiers from Fort Benning’s 29th Infantry Regiment. The first Lieutenant William T. Ryder was the test platoon’s […]

Officers at Ft. Benning, where 200,000 paratroopers have been trained since the first U.S. airborne test unit was formed there in 1941, call the Capewell release a significant military improvement, one that theoretically can save hundreds of lives, greatly reduce the number of injuries in troop jumps, and vastly increase the potential effectiveness of combat […]

Did you know that the same life-saving hardware used on today’s troop parachutes is essentially the same tried and true device that’s been in service for over 50 years? The best story of how the Capewell release came to be was written in the 1960s when the T-10 parachute was first adopted by the U.S. […]