The Army Special Forces Command Women's High Altitude Parachute Team won its first overall title at the International Military Athletics Federation High Altitude Parachute Competition at San Javier Air Base, Murcia, Spain, Nov. 15-21, the Army said Thursday. Pictured here, the Army Special Forces Women's Team descends during the International Military Sports Federation High Altitude Parachute Competition./Army

The Women’s High Altitude Parachuting Team of the Special Warfare Command of the Republic of Korea (ROK Army) won the first overall title at the International Military Sports Federation High Altitude Parachuting Competition, held at San Javier Air Base in Murcia, Spain, from May 15-21.

The Special Forces Women's High Jump Team won the first-ever overall title at the International Military Sports Federation High Jump Competition.

The Army announced the news on Thursday, saying it had “achieved a golden descent.”

The event is an invitational competition for the top 10 nations that performed well at the 45th World Military Parachuting Championships held last June. South Korea represented Asia and competed in three events: interactive, precision, and style parachuting. Other competitors included Spain, Germany, Austria, Morocco, Turkiye, Qatar, and the Czech Republic.

The women’s team, consisting of Kim Sung-mi, Park Isul, Lee Ji-seon, Lee Jin-young, and Lee Hyun-ji, won a gold medal in the interactive activity, a silver medal in the precision descent team event, a silver and bronze medal in the style descent individual event, and a bronze medal in the individual overall.

The interactive event is a 35-second freefall in which four parachutists, separated from their aircraft at approximately 10,000 feet (3048 meters), compete to see how accurately and as many times as possible they can form five randomly selected formations out of 25 possible formations. They are accompanied by a “fifth team member,” a camera flyer, who films the process and submits the footage to the judges.

At the Games, the interactive event was initially scheduled to last eight rounds. However, due to a heat wave with temperatures exceeding 50 degrees and strong winds, the event was shortened to four rounds. Our athletes maintained their lead from the first round and scored a total of 91 points in the four rounds to win the gold medal, beating Morocco with 89 points and Spain with 48 points.

Another event, the Precision Drop, was held at about 3500 feet in the air, where the athletes had to drop to the center of a 16-centimeter radius disc, with a penalty of one point for every centimeter away from the center. After eight rounds of competition, Korea won the silver medal, which was a great achievement after the country’s first medal (bronze) at last year’s event.

She also won the individual silver and bronze medals in her second appearance in the style descent event, which requires the fastest two left, right, and reverse turns each while descending from approximately 7,000 feet.

Combining the results of the three events, the ROK Special Forces Women’s High Altitude Parachute Team won the overall women’s title.

Members of the Army Specialist Women's Team receive their medals at an awards ceremony. /Army

Most of our team members are Gold Laurel Medal holders with more than 1,000 abseils.

In addition to performing their basic duties, the team prepared for the competition by holding regular early morning physical training sessions and conducting several simulated high-altitude parachuting drills. In the interactive event, the team focused on training to form up quickly and accurately, having mastered 25 prescribed formations, the specialist said. The team also practiced for various contingencies, such as mismatched signals or one athlete being separated from the formation. The relatively lightweight parachutists also had to deal with the difficulty of wearing lead belts around their waists throughout the training, as the weight of the four athletes had to be matched to ensure the speed of their descent.

“From the moment we left the aircraft in the air, we focused on constant repetition mastery and teamwork to minimize the variables we might encounter,” said Sergeant Lee Jin-young, who won the silver medal in the individual style parachuting competition. “I am proud to have achieved such a valuable result after last year, and I would like to give all the glory to my husband and daughter, who have always believed in me and supported me, and to my teammates who shared the skies of Spain with me.”

Lt. Col. Choi Soo-ok, head of the team, said, “This result was achieved through the efforts of the players based on the intense practical training of the Special Warriors,” adding, “The Special Warriors will continue to make every effort to maximize their combat capabilities and perfect their combat readiness.”