The Conservative Cave
Current Events => General Discussion => Topic started by: Ptarmigan on February 02, 2008, 03:15:14 PM
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45 year old D.B. Cooper enters Portland International Airport. Cooper uses the name Dan Cooper to buy a one-way ticket to Sea-Tac International Airport on November 24, 1971, a Wednesday before Thanksgiving. He boards Northwest Flight 305, a Boeing 727-100. He boards the airplane and attracts no attention. He is wearing suit with a pearl tie and wearing a homburg hat. The airplane starts to taxi and take off from the runway. Flight attendant Flo Schaffner walks by and he hands her a note. Men traveling alone handed nots to flight attendants as a way to pass hotel and phone numbers. When she walked a second time, Cooper says to Schaffner, "You'd better read that. I have a bomb." From there, the hijacking starts. Schaffer then goes to the cockpit and notifies Captain William Scott. They are required to cooperate. He orders Schaffner to sit next to her. Cooper shows her briefcase. He also tells the pilot not to land, until the money and parachute are there for him to get. This is exchange for all the passengers on board, which amounts to $200,000.
As the hijacking happens, very few passengers knew what was going on. The airplane lands at Sea-Tac and demands it goes to Mexico City and flies slowly and at lower altitude. As the airplane is flying, two F-106 are dispatched to follow it, but it flies at Mach 2. The weather conditions were not great. He goes through the rear door of the Boeing 727 and parachutes out at around 8:05 PM. With him is the $200,000 money. From there, he is never seen again. Hijackings were very common in the 1960s and 70s. In fact two-thirds of them were recorded during that time period. They were mostly committed by political factions to skyjackings in which the hijacker wanted money. Hijackings back then did not result in airplane intentionally being crashed into a building, which happened on September 11, 2001, which claimed 3,000 lives. Then in 1980, a 8 year old boy found money which had matching serial numbers that Cooper had. Presumably, he either died in the Pacific Northwest forest or somehow survived and someone waited to pick him up. Years later, some people claimed to be D.B. Cooper, but none were every confirmed. A close one was in 2000 with Duane Cooper, but it came inconclusive. Nobody knows what really happened to him. D.B. Cooper remains the only unsolved hijacking to this day.
Crime Library-DB Cooper (http://www.crimelibrary.com/criminal_mind/scams/DB_Cooper/index.html)
US News and World Report-DB Cooper (http://www.usnews.com/usnews/doubleissue/mysteries/cooper.htm)
Wikipedia-DB Cooper (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._B._Cooper)
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There was a guy on Coast to Coast AM a couple weeks ago (Galen Cook) who claims to have an up-to-date picture of Cooper.
The name he used to buy his ticket was his brother's name. :evillaugh:
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In 1980, a boy digging a fire pit in Vancouver, Washington found some of the money half-buried in the dirt and snow. The serial numbers matched those from D.B. Cooper's take, but the $5,800 found was a small portion of the $200,000 taken. Later in 1980, Mt. St. Helens erupted, burying any other potential evidence under a pile of ash.
http://www.rotten.com/library/crime/unsolved-crimes/d-b-cooper/
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This case has always fascinated me, and I've always wondered what happened to him. I guess we'll likely never really know for sure, but the possibilities are so many and often interesting to speculate on.
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There was a guy on Coast to Coast AM a couple weeks ago (Galen Cook) who claims to have an up-to-date picture of Cooper.
The name he used to buy his ticket was his brother's name. :evillaugh:
we heard that guy...! we only moved up here about 11 years ago, so we arent familiar with the story, but it sounds pretty interesting. I'm reading a different book right now, but D.B. Cooper might be next up since we live in the area.