DB Cooper

[snowmman 3]

Hey, I always had the mental image of white cords around the white money bag, I guess from all the tv shows.

But the cords were pink right? (we've posted many photos before)

So we've got pink cords around the white money bag?

[Amazon 7]

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We've seen eagles around the DZ on numerous occasions. So perhaps your jumpers in Oregon are safe with our ex-pilot.

Actually.... up here in Northern Washington State our little DZ that we had going for 3 years at Mt Vernon is just 1/4 mile from the Skagit River. It has some very large concentrations of Bald Eagles at some times of the year. The pick up salmon... especially those that are spawned out from the top of the water colum all along the river. They also go after birds... like ducks and geese and I have seen them go after collapsible PILOT CHUTES.. trailing behind peoples canopies on a few occasions. I have seen eagles flying under me many many times as I am heading back to the DZ from opening over the river. I haveeven had one paceme for a few hundred yards.... just watching me... it was kinda fun flying with the eagles.... since on so many jumps you get to fly with some real turkeys

[snowmman 3]

I've been reviewing articles about Blake Payne, the guy on the boat with the rake that dragged the Columbia for Tosaw.

Interestingly, he found more things then that nylon that was discounted.

This article has him finding canvas, a bit of nylon cord, and a bone...with the canvas and nylon cord appearing old.
I guess they decided it was just random junk.

But what's interesting is that Payne had moved to about a mile downstream from the I5 bridge..i.e. closer to the true flight path, rather than up by where the money was found. This was based on Tosaw's belief of where the flight path was (maybe Tosaw didn't have the FBI flight path...the article didn't mention Tosaw getting any info from FBI)

This was Dec 18, 1982

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=9s0TAAAAIBAJ&sjid=QuIDAAAAIBAJ&pg=2139,4842389&hl=en

the bone was found on the river bank.

Even if it was not connected, it's interesting to muse about how long those items were down there.

there was another time he found some olive-drab material he thought was parachute material, but FBI weren't interested because of the color.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=dZszAAAAIBAJ&sjid=rTIHAAAAIBAJ&pg=5173,5902299&dq=db-cooper+olive+drab+payne&hl=en

The other discounted piece of nylon was found later by a guy named Curtis Rainey who volunteered for Tosaw. That was Nov, 1988. Cossey dismissed the find.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=f20VAAAAIBAJ&sjid=0eEDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6924,6748308&dq=tosaw+pilot+chute+cooper&hl=en

It was found at Frenchman's Bar in the pilings
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=wpozAAAAIBAJ&sjid=lzIHAAAAIBAJ&pg=7018,2860640&hl=en

picture of that item was here (previously posted)
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=z7QpAAAAIBAJ&sjid=rO8DAAAAIBAJ&pg=6791,6415367&dq=tosaw+pilot+chute+cooper&hl=en

Rainey noted there was bunch of other junk there: a part of a refrigerator, and a boat propellor.

[Orange1 0]

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Soooo, what was the hit movie of 1972, a mere 37 days after Cooper's jump? Pink Flamingos......Bingo. There must be something else, I just need time to pink.

Di you know that pink in a rig or canopy reduces its resale value by a lot? Isn't that crazy? Even a pink reserve gets discounted in the used market. A reserve is like underwear, nobody's gonna see it unless things get frantic.

377

Hm, one of my (male) teammates has a pink reserve (cos it was cheaper). He had to chop at Nationals. Every time our team name was announced after that, the word "pink" would get inserted somewhere

I think my favourite silly song lyrics of all time are Aerosmith's "Pink is like red but not quite".

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[Orange1 0]

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We've seen eagles around the DZ on numerous occasions. So perhaps your jumpers in Oregon are safe with our ex-pilot.

Actually.... up here in Northern Washington State our little DZ that we had going for 3 years at Mt Vernon is just 1/4 mile from the Skagit River. It has some very large concentrations of Bald Eagles at some times of the year. The pick up salmon... especially those that are spawned out from the top of the water colum all along the river. They also go after birds... like ducks and geese and I have seen them go after collapsible PILOT CHUTES.. trailing behind peoples canopies on a few occasions. I have seen eagles flying under me many many times as I am heading back to the DZ from opening over the river. I haveeven had one paceme for a few hundred yards.... just watching me... it was kinda fun flying with the eagles.... since on so many jumps you get to fly with some real turkeys

And salmon are pink
Never had an eagle shadow me but other jumpers have. My husband used to paraglide, and on a number of occasions shared thermals with eagles. Awesome.

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[377 22]

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And salmon are pink

I haven't spent half my occupational life chasing pink fish. Salmon are ORANGE.

Got it?

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[377 22]

Cossey was right. That is not a bailout rig pilot chute. They have a big entrapped spring.

Wonder what it was? Parachute flare canopy?

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[377 22]

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So we've got pink cords around the white money bag?

Take a look at that photo of Ckret and the reserve. I wonder if you could fasten a reserve container to a non D ring equipped harness by using the pack opening bands and bringing them around behind the reserve container. They have hooks on the ends. Could you pass them through the harness webbing then connect them hook to hook? The POBs have poweful springs inside to hold tension when they are stretched.

Riggers, your opinions?

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[snowmman 3]

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I haven't spent half my occupational life chasing pink

hmm. I knew all those skydiving party stories were B.S.

[snowmman 3]

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So we've got pink cords around the white money bag?

Take a look at that photo of Ckret and the reserve. I wonder if you could fasten a reserve container to a non D ring equipped harness by using the pack opening bands and bringing them around behind the reserve container. They have hooks on the ends. Could you pass them through the harness webbing then connect them hook to hook? The POBs have poweful springs inside to hold tension when they are stretched.

Riggers, your opinions?

377

Maybe my old "Big Hook" post can add to this.
from http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3389523;search_string=hooks;#3389523

I managed to get a frame from a CBS news vid that showed Ckret exposing the big hooks on the back of the reserve left behind. Possibly the reserve Cooper took had similar hooks. These are the bigger, old-old style?

I also attached a photo with ckret that seems to show them experimenting with a money bag (it's in the evidence box)

last photo was from a rig page somewhere that I think shows the big hook next to a rule for sizing (inches)

[Orange1 0]

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And salmon are pink

I haven't spent half my occupational life chasing pink fish. Salmon are ORANGE.

Got it?

377

Not when they're on a plate in front of you

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[snowmman 3]

This is a story from The Pittsburgh Press, Jull 11, 1901
They were talking to the person in the Treasury then that gets multilated money (we've discussed the modern version of this)

But in the article, there's an interesting story of money bundle in a famer's field for 6 years, buried under dirt. You could imagine that's a high potential for decomposition (fertile moist earth)

But it didn't all decompose away. And it had no protection. It was pretty unrecognizable on the surface at least.

Reaching down and opening one of the drawers of her desk, Mrs. Brown drew out a tin tobacco box containing what looked like a mass or slab of peat or earth pressed compactly together. It turned out on investigation to be a roll of money, amounting originally to about $200, which a farmer had ploughed under the ground while turning a furrow on his farm.

He had carried it about his person when ploughing and in some way had lost it by its dropping out of his pocket. WHen he had finished ploughing he missed the money, and having searched the ploughed area in vain gave up the quest.

Each time, however, he went over the same field with the plough in each succeeding season he kept his eye on anything that would be likely to look like the lost money.

Finally after the bills had lain under the ground for six years his search was rewarded and last spring his ploughshare unearthed the blacked mass which lay in the tobacco box.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=TxIbAAAAIBAJ&sjid=i0gEAAAAIBAJ&pg=2756,7885226&dq=money+fragments&hl=en

my reading is that the tin box was just to hold the money after the find..that the money was just a roll in the ground.

[Sluggo_Monster 0]

All,


I got an approval request for the NORJAK Forum today from an interesting individual. When I asked for background info about him, I got this e-mail:


From: REDACTED [mailto:redacted@xxxx.com]
Sent: Saturday, January 23, 2010 5:10 PM
To: sluggo@n467us.com
Subject: RE: You Are Approved


Hi...

I found your site when searching for Ted Mayfield. I see he's being accused of being D.B. Cooper which is absurd.

Ted gave me my 1st flying job in PDX in 1964.

I was probably responsible for the D.B. Cooper hijacking. I was working at Continental Airlines and flying on my time off at the Pacific Parachute Center. They were excited about a DC-3 coming to town for a "mass" jump of 21 skydivers. Hmmm.... well, how about 110 Skydivers?

I showed a group of skydivers how to operate the door on a 727 (our airplane overnighting in PDX) and about 2 weeks I think it was later guess what happened.

I spent Thanksgiving day at the FBI. So, you can see why I'm interested. Is this Ralph??

Redacted
Redacted, AZ

I’ve had several other communications with him since this one. It seems he was a friend of Tom Bohan’s. I awaiting a reply about whether or not Tom ever mentioned his 21 NOV 1971 flight “in trail” of Flight 305.

Comments? (Like I have to ask for some

Sluggo

Web Page
Blog
NORJAK Forum

[Amazon 7]

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And salmon are pink

I haven't spent half my occupational life chasing pink fish. Salmon are ORANGE.

Got it?

377

Not when they're on a plate in front of you

You are probably eating that anemic Atlantic salmon.

I prefer the Chinook (king) salmon.. and they are a deep red meat when they just approaching the rivers in the fall and the last one I caught was a little fella at 35 pounds. Coho (silver) salmon and the Sockeye(red) are an orange colored meat, the Pink (Humpie) salmon up here are pink though. We also have sea run cutthroat trout as well as Steelhead( rainbow trout) that go to sea. Both of them are usually good eating but again fairly light colored. all of them run up the Skagit River and when they show up... the eagles always show up.

[Sluggo_Monster 0]

All,

More e-mails from the pilot {Emphasis mine}:



________________________________________
From: Redacted
Sent: Saturday, January 23, 2010 7:03 PM
To: sluggo@n467us.com
Subject: RE: You Are Approved

Rubber bands last, what, a week in the elements?

And yes, I knew Tom Bohan very well. Great guy.

Oh... I have a photo taken in 1986 of my son and I as we were boarding our jump ship for a skydive along with our jumpmaster. Guess who he was?

Redacted



________________________________________
From: Sluggo@N467US.com
To: redacted
Subject: RE: You Are Approved
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 2010 19:25:28 -0600

Who... Ted?... Maybe Earl Cossey?

Did you ever talk to T. Bohan about his activities on 21 Nov 1971?

I have some info that he was "in trail" of Flight 305 after it left SEA but before it passed over PDX. Supposedly he was @ 16,000 MSL and 4 miles behind (I'd have to check to get actual numbers) and having some really bad weather with high winds that were different than the WS/WD used to determine Cooper's LZ.

You ever discuss that with Tom?

The "Science Team" has some samples of rubber bands from the same formula and are studying the decay times under different conditions. It seems that UV is a rubber killer, but in water (low O2, low UV) or in sand they last longer.

Sluggo



________________________________________
From: REDACTED
Sent: Saturday, January 23, 2010 7:35 PM
To: sluggo@n467us.com
Subject: RE: You Are Approved

No, not Ted or Earl. The guy bears a striking resemblance to the person in question. Steve Fisher. Great jumpmaster & fun guy, now deceased. I'll see if I can get that copied. You put 15 years on D.B.'s photo and that's who you see.

Yes, I vaguely recall Tom telling that story. Vaguely. The years play hell on a guys memory. I don't trust mine that well anymore for recent occurances. Whether my memories of that time are dead-assed accurate could be in question. But, I think they are.

One thing I'm sure of is that Ted Mayfield is/was not D.B. Cooper.

Happy Days...



So….
Any of you PDX area skydivers know Steve Fisher? Do you have any photos? Do you know about his history?


Sluggo

Web Page
Blog
NORJAK Forum

[snowmman 3]

Sluggo reported "The "Science Team" has some samples of rubber bands from the same formula and are studying the decay times under different conditions."

So is the theory that there is some amount of time, where there is no storage method that will preserve rubber bands, at least not one that could be replicated by natural conditions?

Does that mean collectors of rubber bands have a hard problem? Or only collectors of this specific type?

It's hard to believe that all rubber bands of that formula disappear from the face of the earth, within years of manufacture.

Or is the period more like 10 years?

I can't imagine how the scientists are going to measure this, unless the expected time period is less than a year? Any attempt at acceleration would seem to nullify the experiment?

How long were the rubber bands on the money when the money was in the vault? Do they have to replace those rubber bands every year? Why do they last in the vault, but not buried in sand?
microbes? moisture? cold? heat?

The microbes need a specific moisture level, I thought. Too dry or too moist, prevents growth.

The guys who deal with rubber tires in museums have experience with this.

(edit) cold seems to be important for preserving rubber bands.
Testing the lifetime of a stretched vs a non-stretched rubber band is different. Have to decide how much stretch too.

[Orange1 0]

Wow Sluggo.. that all does sound interesting.
Following the discussions around the fact that no-one (other than Air America) at the time apparently knew you could open a 727 door in flight (remember the transcripts of the hijacking), did you ask the pilot how he knew this?

Any more background on Steve Fisher? Does anyone know if he was on the FBI suspect list?

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[snowmman 3]

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Any more background on Steve Fisher? Does anyone know if he was on the FBI suspect list?

"Oh... I have a photo taken in 1986 of my son and I as we were boarding our jump ship for a skydive along with our jumpmaster."


Maybe I just arrived on this planet.

Why does it make sense that Steve Fisher is Cooper based on him being a jumpmaster in 1986 and looking like an age-enhanced Cooper sketch?

Is the theory that any jumpmasters in 1986 that looked like a age-enhanced Cooper sketch make sense to look at?

Should we start a list?

The only connection is that there was a guy who showed someone a 727 door, and the door show-er and his son jumped with Fisher in 1986 and have a picture?

(edit) The door show-er also knows Tom Bohan, or did.

(edit) The door show-er didn't say he showed how to open the door in flight. How could he be flying a 727 with a bunch of guys from the DZ? Not likely. The plane had to be just on the ground.

[snowmman 3]

I can't believe this stupid pud-yanking story. (edit) or that Orange1 leaps to conclusions not supported by the post? What's up with that?

These guys are going to jump a DC-3.
What door on the 727 did the guy show them?
If it was learning/info for the DC-3 jump, wouldn't it have been a side door?

I still don't get it.

And how many people are on the damn Science Team? Is the metallurgist fired since the silver nitrate debacle? Is there a rubber guy there now?

How many do you need for a team?

[Orange1 0]

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Is the theory that any jumpmasters in 1986 that looked like a age-enhanced Cooper sketch make sense to look at?

Yes. Or at least as good as any theory we have looked at so far.

Skydiving: wasting fossil fuels just for fun.

[snowmman 3]

I have a better theory.

Doesn't it make sense that someone who could climb a tower with an excavator, could have done it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RobaJKGMMiE&feature=player_embedded

(note this vid is not faked. Really)

(edit) stills from another time, for the impatient.

(edit) For fun, Duane Weber getting a Bobcat back on the truck after digging a grave for a victim.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rW2WHnj0HA

[snowmman 3]

During a private “fly-in” fishing excursion in the Alaskan wilderness, the chartered pilot and fishermen left a cooler-box of fish and bait inside the plane. A bear smelled it and this is what he did to the plane...

The pilot used his cell phone, and had another pilot bring him 2 new tires, 3 cases of duct tape, and a supply of plastic sheets.

Plane truth - they patched the plane together, and flew it home!

Amazon jumped the plane afterwards, and has certified it as jumper-worthy.

(edit) The actual story is here
http://neveryetmelted.com/2010/01/15/bear-damaged-plane-repaired-with-duct-tape-then-flown-home/

[Sluggo_Monster 0]

Do not answer a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him.

Web Page
Blog
NORJAK Forum

[snowmman 3]

Quote

Do not answer a fool according to his folly, lest you be also be like him.

were you trying to insult someone, Sluggo?

The best insult is one which just flays the opponent directly.

Obscurity is used to hide lack of firepower, isn't it?

[377 22]

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The pilot used his cell phone, and had another pilot bring him 2 new tires, 3 cases of duct tape, and a supply of plastic sheets.

We had an Aeronca Sedan jumpship at Livermore in the late 60s that didn't look much better.

It was called The RAT.

Any old timers remember Perry Steves' RAT?

Made my first jump from her.

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.