Ep 188: D. B. Cooper Part 1

“Miss, I have a bomb here and would like you to sit by me.”

– A note passed by skyjacker “Dan Cooper” to Northwest Orient Airlines Flight Attendant Florence Schaffner, somewhere over Washington State on November 24, 1971

Description:

On the afternoon of Thanksgiving eve, November 24, 1971, a smartly dressed man approached the flight counter for Northwest Orient Airlines at Portland International Airport and purchased a one-way ticket to Seattle. The name he gave was "Dan Cooper" as he paid cash to board Flight 305, a short 30-minute trip that would turn into one of the longest criminal manhunts in modern history. Once aboard, Cooper's requests to Flight Attendant Florence Schaffner were simple: a bourbon and soda, and a note to be delivered to the captain demanding $200,000 in cash and four parachutes. To add emphasis to his order, Cooper briefly showed Schaffner what appeared to be a bomb in the black attaché case he carried with him. Calm and polite throughout the ordeal, Cooper was now instructing the pilots to take him to Mexico City during the refueling stop in Seattle. However, it was never his intention to go that far. Cooper's additional demands were now that the Boeing 727 fly not higher than 10,000 feet, with the landing gear still deployed, the wing flaps lowered, the cabin depressurized, and at the lowest airspeed possible without stalling the aircraft. Around 8:13 p.m., the aft airstairs of the jet deployed, and Cooper would leap into a cold rainstorm of a western Washington night and popular culture forever. Due to a name mixup with an early suspect by a local news reporter, the public would also forever know "Dan Cooper" as "D. B. Cooper." The mystery of Cooper's true identity and fate, along with the whereabouts of most of the ransom money, would launch a 45-year investigation by the FBI. His piracy would become a legend and the only unsolved skyjacking case in the history of commercial aviation.

A police sketch artist’s composite of “Dan Cooper” from eye-witnesses like Flight Attendants Florence Schaffner and Tina Mucklow

The black J.C. Penney clip-on tie and Mother of Pearl tie clip Cooper wore during the skyjacking and removed before jumping. The FBI later recovered a DNA sample from it.

One of the parachutes left behind by Cooper and its canvas deployment bag. He jumped with two of the four provided, taking one that was used for instruction and had been sewn shut.

Cooper’s $20 plane ticket as FBI evidence. ©AP

The map used by the FBI to extrapolate a search area where Cooper may have landed

Some of the ransom $20 bills found by 8-year-old Brian Ingram on February 10, 1980, while vacationing with his family at Tina Bar on the Columbia River, downstream from Vancouver, WA

Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 on the tarmac at SeaTac while hijacked. ©AP

Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 crew speak with reporters on Nov. 26, 1971. ©AP

Flight Attendant Florence Schaffner who initially received the note from Cooper. ©AP

Flight Attendant Tina Mucklow who remained on board with Cooper while he escaped. ©AP

A search of the area in 1976 where Cooper may have landed in. ©AP

Reference Links:

• The D. B. Cooper entry on Wikipedia

• “D. B. Cooper Hijacking” entry from the FBI.gov website

• “D.B. Cooper Redux – Help Us Solve the Enduring Mystery” from the FBI.gov website

• "A reporter’s role in the notorious unsolved mystery of ‘D.B. Cooper’" from the Columbia Journalism Review

• PDF: “The incredible tale of DB Cooper and the most fascinating hijacking case in history” by Hugh Morris from The Telegraph

• “The Hunt for DB Cooper – Who’s Who in the DB Cooper investigation” by Brian A. Smith on The Mountain News – WA, Jan 27, 2013

• The D. B. Cooper entry from the CrimeMuseum.org website

• “New suspect in D.B. Cooper skyjacking case unearthed by Army data analyst; FBI stays mum” from The Oregonian

• “As new evidence upends D.B. Cooper case, the (un)usual suspects continue to fuel the legend” from The Oregonian

 

Location:

Early calculations by authorities placed “D. B. Cooper’s” possible landing zone somewhere south of Mt. St. Helens near Lake Merwin, and several miles southeast of the town of Ariel, WA, based on his likely jump time of 8:13 p.m. from a Boeing 727 on November 24, 1971

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Related Books & Media:

Norjak: The Investigation of D.B. Cooper

By Himmelsbach, Ralph P

Buy on Amazon

D. B. Cooper: What Really Happened

By Max Gunther

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D.B. Cooper: The Real McCoy

By Rhodes, Bernie

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Skyjack: The Hunt for D. B. Cooper

By Gray, Geoffrey

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CREDITS:

Episode 188: D. B. Cooper Part 1.  Produced by Scott Philbrook & Forrest Burgess; Audio Editing by Sarah Vorhees Wendel. Sound Design by Ryan McCullough; Tess Pfeifle, Producer, and Lead Researcher; Research Support from the astonishing League of Astonishing Researchers, a.k.a. The Astonishing Research Corps, or "A.R.C." for short. Copyright 2020 Astonishing Legends Productions, LLC. All Rights Reserved.