When a family managed to find an old parachute in their Amboy, Washington home earlier this year (reported by the FBI on March 24), it managed to be recently re-used in D.B. Cooper’s hijack case. Why is there so much interest and recent clues suddenly coming back into the picture in the last six months is something interesting – although everything just seems to make the case deeper and it all unravels more and more. Even if the parachute found in SW Washington turns out to be the Navy Backpack 6 that Cooper jumped from, it still won’t prove if Cooper is alive somewhere or died in the jump. But while I’m sure the FBI takes satisfaction in solving more cases – the iconic status of the Cooper case may just allow some agents to prolong the mystery as a piece of American … and an emblematic warning about airport security.
For many of those younger people who are not familiar with D.B. Cooper case–you are in one of the greatest American International-airport name “Dan Cooper” (the ” D.B.” later released on suspicion). Looking quite a bit like the future Men in Black with a dark suit and sunglasses–Cooper delivered the air on the board. annotated saying that he would have detonated the bomb in the shortest possible time if he didn’t have $200,000 (everything in crushed $20 bills) and four parachutes to detonate. Surprisingly, he required two parachutes back up and then two emergency parachutes around his chest. This seems to suggest that he had someone on board who would jump with him.
Well, that Cooper transcript also seems to suggest that he was a mild-mannered hijacker. All the recollections from those who spoke to him seem to contradict each other as to how he presented himself. Aeria (who talked with him more than anyone else) remembered that he was friendly and religious towards travelers and sailors. The FBI always contradicts this by saying that he was an average S.O.B.–he can avoid the mythic man who is already done anyway. When Cooper ordered the plane to land at Seattle-Tacoma Airport, he ordered the search, and spent the users, methodically confirmed. The passengers were released without fraud. It now seems likely that the bomb he threatened to detonate from his briefcase was fake. In the case of Al Qaeda terror today – obviously it won’t.
We would only wish that today’s kidnapping would be benign so that the faithful travelers would not be harmed before committing the crime. Cooper waging war, even if he had to do it by repelling it, is a little too long. It is surprising that he and a few fellow sailors were alone in that place – yet he was threatening to blow up the plane … which he just killed himself. They don’t move very well because it’s probably been proven that there was a fake bomb, but the crowd still acquiesces to their demands. The funds and users have already been delivered into his hands.
When he took off the plane (with the original intention of flying to Mexico City), he asked to fly at a relatively low altitude – knowing full well that if he jumped 25,000 or higher, he would never make it out alive. However, many flight experts believe that they do not understand that it is technically possible to be killed by jumping even 10,000 feet. That didn’t stop him, however, from doing just that after dropping down the aft stairs on the plane and jumping out – he never appeared again. Many people may have thought that he was taking the hostage with him (hence the four parachutes) – but I wonder if someone on the plane knew someone earlier – but he left when he released all the passengers in Seattle.
If Cooper had managed to survive his jump — it would have been an amazing feat of survival considering the rain and altitude at the point of his jump somewhere over the Oregon-Washington border.
The continuing story of Cooper surviving the forest…
To “Ripley Believe it or not!” at the wax museum in Newport, Oregon (on the Oregon Coast–and a popular attraction)–they have a little diorama inside of a wax figure of D.B. Cooper is hanging from a tree (still wearing his sunglasses) with a parachute somewhere in the Southern Washington desert. We believe him to be alive – for they do not show him to be slipping away as if he were dead. In an ingenious lighting process, however, they use a little mirror effect to make it appear as if he has climbed up and disappeared from the tree when you turn a corner. Many foolish tourists see this as a mirror illusion, but it’s a lot to laugh at… especially when you know how the illusion is made and others don’t. It also helps reinforce Cooper’s mythology and how much of a pop culture icon he has become for more recent generations.
A lot of people like to think that Cooper managed the land and somehow got away with the company with that money. The more logical scenario is that he was too dumb to realize that jumping at 10,000 feet would probably tear him apart, although he didn’t necessarily wipe out all the money. That incident came at a point in 1980 when a kid took about $5,000 dollars worth of that $200,000 dollars spread across the Columbia River in Vancouver, Washington. Two years earlier, the directive board for the AFI plane was found in the same general location. ALL D. SAID D.B. Cooper coming out–he was somewhere in SW Washington.
On the other hand, some recent evidence suggests that “Dan Cooper” may have survived, based on a recent deathbed confession and the belief that no one would attempt such a jump unless they had some experience as a paratrooper. Other FBI agents say the real paratrooper checked his parachutes (which Cooper apparently didn’t do) before jumping. Even in blinding rain they will not jump above the clouds. Who’s to say that when you’re in an emotional frenzy, you shouldn’t do what you usually do to get rid of the crime. Airmen who spoke with Cooper for hours on the plane said he appeared to have some knowledge of skydiving and was familiar with the Seattle area.
Myriad confessions of the dead – or the effect of mental hallucinations when near death?
One of the few links in Cooper’s case was in small a group of people who died in life in the last five years all claimed before kicking the bucket he was Dan Cooper. Most of them have been accounted for – except for the one who died recently and is still wanted by the FBI … but has been released for over a year now with no name. On the popular radio show, Coast to Coast – get a picture of this suspect who died in early 2007, claimed to be Cooper’s son and other family members: coasttocoastam.com/shows/2008/01/05.html #db After you see his picture and background, It gives you that feeling that Eureka can be this way. And this man looked like an army Green Beret paratrooper who was stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington. It all seems to add up.
This unidentified man may also be related to Richard McCoy, Jr., who staged a plane hijacking in Colorado four months after the Cooper hijack in 1972. McCoy never admitted he was Cooper (except the FBI thinks they are one and the same. )–but ended up in prison … he later escaped and was killed.
It would be a unique mystery – why would a man do this to an unknown family? Perhaps he managed to save some money, although some of what he had with him from his briefcase was obviously flying. Because he was an experienced paratrooper, he was used to jumping in difficult conditions and was able to resist before landing. We will probably know more about this unknown person at the end of this article.
Then again, maybe not for one particular reason…
The pleasure of a good mystery…
Don’t get this wrong: I know the FBI is working hard to solve as many cases as they can. With Cooper’s case, however, they admit that even that fact is a part of American pop culture that makes for a complicated mystery. After 37 years of this article, when it was suddenly released, it would take away what many people are worried about… including the FBI. It has now been a year since the unknown man mentioned above (and shown) died and the FBI investigation was brought forward. Why would it take this long to make available the DNA and fingerprints left by Cooper on the unknown man who died?
As strange as it sounds, the mystery of having Cooper go for one stand-alone crime, which he can deliberately leave unsolved just to keep the pop culture aspect of him alive for decades to come. Meanwhile, it seems likely that the case has now come down to two scenarios: Cooper is dead and his remains will never be found, or the person above is definitely Cooper and the case will soon be closed. All the other dead confessions (perhaps the effects of pharmaceuticals causing hallucinations and other mind games) and suspects (the previous suspect, John List, who just died this past week, obviously not Cooper) have all become moot.
However, with so many murderous confessions, one wonders if this is some kind of underground crime ring with an unknown person on top of the operation. One man pulling all this alone without at least some back-ups instead seems more logical, if perhaps not necessary if the man was famous enough.
With that in mind, perhaps the FBI has prolonged the mystery a little longer.
