Podcast Episode Details

Jimmy Settle: Pararescueman (PJ) | Special Operator | Purple Heart & Air Medal (V) Recipient | Author

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Jimmy Settle is a retired Air Force Pararescueman (“PJ”) credited with saving 38 lives and assisting in saving 28 others in combat, in addition to saves in the Alaskan wilderness.

He racked up over 270 combat search and rescue hours in Afghanistan, where he earned an Air Medal with Valor for his life saving heroics and a Purple Heart after being shot in the head (and returning to combat 24 hours later).

Jimmy catalogues these and other near death experiences in his book, “Never Quit: From Alaska Wilderness Rescues to Afghanistan Firefights as an Elite Special Ops PJ,” where he shares the friendships, hardships, pranks, and events that changed his life, from being an elite athlete competing at the Naval Academy to completing the daunting PJ pipeline to live saving ops in the most austere environments.

5:47 - What is a PJ and the military’s pararescue.
13:33 - Introduced to PJ by Chris Robertson.
19:43 - “Cardiac Event” aka the first (of many) near death experience.
27:56 - “19 year old decision” to leave the Naval Academy after invasive surgery on the heart.
30:46 - The PJ “Pipeline” of elite training, INDOC (80%+ attrition rate), Combat Divers Course, Airborne, Free Fall, SERE, Pararescue EMT and Apprenticeship.
48:05 - “Cones” aka unfortunate trainees going through the pipeline (better than a Toad, not yet a Maroon Beret).
50:17 - Covertly free climbing Fort Benning’s 250’ Jump Towers for a prank.
52:48 - The “Green Feet” image used by PJs, an homage to Vietnam helos.
58:13 - The first time working on a live patient (intubation) in Philadelphia in a paramedic apprentice program.
1:05:51 - The first rescue from an aircraft as a PJ in Alaska at night in the wilderness to help a woman who had an accident with an ATV, chainsaw, and a scalping.
1:09:51 - Another near death experience while training in Alaska’s Cook Inlet at night.
1:27:29 - Supporting Operation Bulldog Bite in Kunar province, Afghanistan in November 2010.
1:29:21 - Another near death experience getting shot in the head.
1:36:29 - Going back into combat 24 hours after being shot in the head to rescue dozens of people.
1:48:48 - Saving two soldiers on a chopper and thinking, “This is my purpose in life.”
1:49:17 - Losing memory after getting shot in the head and how it creeped in “insidiously.”
1:53:12 - Describing the difficulty in transitioning from the service to the civilian world and the loss of identity.
1:56:36 - Living in a car in the Commissary parking lot until a senior enlisted airmen intervened.
2:02:06 - “Without hesitation” would do it again.

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Published on 4 years, 2 months ago