Hay River (Aug 25/03) - A Hay River cadet now knows what it's like to jump out of a plane.

Dan Jackson, 18, experienced the feeling of stepping through an aircraft door during a five-week basic parachuting course offered by the Canadian Armed Forces.

"Once you stepped off, it was just awesome," says Jackson. "It was the best feeling of my life."

The course in Ontario is the same one members of the regular forces take, explains the master warrant officer with the Hay River Army Cadets Corps.

A section of the course is reserved for 50 cadets from across Canada. Of those, 33 passed the course, including Jackson.

The Grade 12 student at Diamond Jenness secondary school wants to become a parachutist in the Canadian Forces after he graduates high school. "That's what I wanted to do since I started cadets."

Jackson was the only Northern cadet in the course this year. One spot is left open for a Northern region cadet each year, and several others have taken the course in the past.

"It was really something else," he says, noting the course was very physically demanding.

Jackson says he was only nervous just before his first jump, especially when the one-minute warning was given to stand by. Then he was at the door of the plane and looking out at the parachutes opening below. "You don't even think, you just go."

Unlike recreational sky diving, military parachuting is from a much lower altitude. Jackson's jumps were from either 800 or 1,200 feet.

The cadet made five jumps in all, some in full military equipment and one at night. There was moonlight during the night jump, he recalls, "But you couldn't really tell when the ground was coming up."

His mother, Cindy Jackson, says she was excited her son got the opportunity to attend the parachuting training course. "It was something he always wanted to do."