It was raining Humvees last week when a US Army training exercise at Hohenfels military base in Germany went wrong. Three military vehicles detached from their parachute systems and crashed violently to the ground.

An airborne drill at Hohenfels – the main headquarters of the US Army’s Joint Multinational Readiness Center – went wrong when C-130 Hercules tactical airlifters began to put HMMWV (Humvee) military off-roaders on the ground.