Parajumpers’s Kodiak Parka was inspired by Anchorage’s 210th Rescue Squadron.
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Imagine a cross between an emergency room surgeon, Ed Viesturs, and a Green Beret. Imagine this person descending by parachute, or rappelling from a helicopter to save the hide of a mountaineer stuck on Denali, or a commercial fisherman at the mercy of the roiling Bering Sea. That person would probably be a parajumper, one of a small number of highly skilled elite military rescuers.
This jacket was designed with a handful of those people, Alaska Air Guard’s 210th Rescue Squadron, in mind. They do their life-saving in the 49th state’s unforgiving elements.
To read more about the jacket, visit Parajumpers’s web site. To read more about the parajumpers who inspired this coat’s design, check out this book: The Rescue Season: The Heroic Story of Parajumpers on the Edge of the World ($889; parajumpers.it).
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This article originally appeared in the February 2010 issue of Men’s Journal.
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May 12th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
That looks to be a serious jacket, and the description of those who designed it doesn’t leave much room for second guessing. Looks like it could make a great jacket for a chillingly inhospitable environment.
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September 12th, 2010 at 2:15 pm
Looks pretty heavy for me. I love the color also the style. Look warm for me. Hope it’ll work in cold.
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