Ft. Bragg Soldiers Return Home With Flying Colors : Panama: Relatives cheer as 2,000 troops arrive by way of a dramatic parachute jump.

Twenty giant C-141 transport planes streaked across the dawn sky over Ft. Bragg on Friday, leaving behind a swarm of light green parachutes as nearly 2,000 paratroopers floated to Earth on their triumphant return home after invading Panama.

Thousands of relatives packing Ft. Bragg’s Sicily Drop Zone cheered and whistled as the first troops touched down and the division band struck up a John Philip Sousa march.

The commanding general, Lt. Gen. Carl Stiner, was the first to jump and later paid tribute to those troops who died during the Dec. 20 invasion of Panama.

“Our experience gives meaning to the expression that freedom isn’t free,” Stiner said during a welcoming ceremony at the drop zone. “Everyone knew there would be personal danger but not a single one hesitated to go or to enter a battle.

“You would have been very proud of your soldiers. No one has ever been more disciplined under fire or more mature in carrying out their duties,” he added. “The Panamanians will always be thankful because we gave back to them that which had been stolen from them the past 10 years--their freedom. We’re proud we did it.”

Asked why the soldiers returned home by jumping out of planes instead of walking off them, base spokesman Capt. Lewis Boone said: “Their primary means of deployment is jumping. They will jump whenever possible--over here, over there, anywhere.”

As the 1,924 soldiers approached the ground, they lowered their packs and rifles on lines to lighten the load while landing. Stiner said the troopers’ front-carried packs weighed 100 pounds when fully loaded with ammunition, as they were during the invasion.

The 82nd Airborne Division troops conducted a night parachute assault onto the capital airfield east of Panama City, secured it, and moved out within hours to secure other targets, officials said.

Four soldiers received minor injuries in Friday’s jump, a spokesman said.

Families and soldiers had 30 minutes to greet one another before the troops resumed formation to march to their barracks.

The sight of the paratroopers floating to the ground choked up Kathleen Salino, of North Hollywood, Calif., who flew in to greet her son, Spec. Cass Hadaway.

“I’m just amazed, stunned,” she said. “I was very upset when he left. From what I read in the paper, they had a rough time over there. He’s my first-born son. This has changed my whole life.”

Patricia Tipton hugged her son, Capt. Donald Fontenot, 28, and handed him the thing he missed the most in Panama--fast food.

“I told her I wanted an Egg McMuffin and a Diet Coke,” Fontenot said. “That’s all I’ve been thinking about.”

Staff Sgt. Vicki Zamora, 27, one of two women on the division’s manifest, was stationed in a Panamanian building that had been under mortar fire. She was greeted by her husband, Gus Zamora, 34, and their three children.

Asked if women should go into in combat, she replied: “We all train as a team, and we need to fight as a team.”

Stiner said everyone in the invasion came under fire because the troops attacked 27 targets simultaneously.