It's a Real Life MIP!

SpiritPlumber spotted a neat article with some familiar looking hardware. Apparently in the late '90s, a UK firm developed a person-carrying enclosure that attaches to the weapon hard point of a small helicopter or jet. The "Exint" pods were designed to insert special forces soldiers or extract wounded troops. Although the idea might lead someone to assume a few British engineers were just big fans of Wing Commander 4's Manned Insertion Pods, it apparently goes as far back as WW2. All of the real life variants look super cramped compared to the item that Pliers found!

It’s almost impossible to imagine the self discipline required to be stuck inside one of those for long periods of time but, believe it or not, Exint pods, man-carrying pods designed to be carried by fast jets and choppers exist.

They were conceived as an alternate method of inserting and extracting special forces (or wounded soldiers) and were developted by AVPRO UK Ltd in the late 1990s. They were reportedly tested on the Harrier jump jet, the AH-64 Apache and, according to some sources, were as still are certified for use on the Israeli AH-1 Cobra attack helicopters.