Special Forces soldiers, wearing oxygen apparatus and with night vision goggles mounted on their helmets, prepare to conduct a high-altitude freefall parachute jump. These Green Berets are students on the Military Free-Fall Advanced Tactical Infiltration Course (ATIC), an advanced skills training program run by the JFK Special Warfare Center and School at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona. Recent military free-fall combat drops by special operations forces in Afghanistan and Iraq highlighted the need for a dedicated Advanced Tactical Infiltration Course.

The Military Free-Fall Advanced Tactical Infiltration Course is a 3-week course that focuses on High Altitude High Opening (HAHO) techniques. The course covers computer-guided and compass-driven navigation, night-vision rigging and emergency procedures, rigging of nonstandard combat equipment and weapons, grouping and canopy flight into unmarked or blacked-out drop zones, and the rigging, loading and deployment of GPS-guided bundles. Students will plan and execute several nighttime, oxygen HAHO operations, from 25,000 feet, using night-vision goggles in complete blackout conditions and navigating onto unfamiliar or unmarked drop zones.