olemisscub

Tom said 79.6 feet of cord is missing.

It's plausible, but I think my main issue with that scenario would be that Cooper was seemingly already accoutered for the jump when they took off from Seattle. He may have had some gloves or a beanie or something in his mystery bag that he was able to put on quickly once Tina left, but it seems like he had already done all of his cutting and tying, etc, before they took off. After takeoff it appears that he became preoccupied almost immediately with getting the door down. So I think the fact that he appeared ready to jump outside Seattle (without wearing the reserve) is a good indication that he was willing to jump without one. However, it appears likely that if he was wanting to jump outside Seattle that once that window had passed he was forced to wait until closer to Portland. So maybe what you're suggesting is what he did in the meantime once he realized he had some time?

Dude if you can't see the difference in these parachutes packs, then I'm not exactly sure what to tell you. This really isn't complicated. Cooper's chute may have been an NB6, but the MUSEUM CHUTE is NOT. First, you will not find an NB-6 that is tan colored like the WWII packs were. Second, NB models have round shaped folds at the bottom, the WWII ones are straight. Third, NB models have thicker straps going down the back than the WWII ones.

Unless I have a legitimate reason to think otherwise, yes.

It’s hard to argue this point when it had been repacked TWICE after Hayden got it back. Those riggers would have realized it wasn’t a 26 in there at that time edit: looks like Fly beat me to it

Speak of the devil. Latest Vault:

I hadn’t thought of it from that angle. That would be indeed be a necessary contingency.

Oh, he went to LA last month where they are filming the movie about his skyjacking. He texted me some pics.

Had another long call with McNally the other night. Some observations/interesting tidbits. These first two should sound familiar: - His "Tina", Sharon Weathersby, asked him if he had a problem with American Airlines and she asked why he picked them. He told her that he thought AA was a reputable company and that they would do the right thing. I asked if that was the truth or if he just picked them because it fit his plan. He said he was telling the truth. Said he didn't want to go with Braniff or some other crummier airline. I told him how remarkably similar that conversation was with what occurred in the Cooper case. I explained it all to him and when I repeated Cooper's "I just have a grudge" line, he laughed and said "That's a hell of a line! Suppose that's smoother than admitting you're just robbing the sumbitch." (I've been proposing for a while now that the grudge line, while it may have been a true statement by Cooper, is likely overanalyzed...glad he thinks so too!) - I asked him what the last communication he had with anyone in the aircraft was. He said "I called up to the cockpit and told them I couldn't get the stairs down and that maybe they should slow down some." - He had a pistol in his mystery bag. I asked him why he had that given that he already had a submachine gun. He said it was intended for use on the ground in the event he needed to carjack someone. His plan was either to hotwire a car or hitchhike and then carjack the driver. When the first car that offered to give him a ride was the Sheriff's patrol car, he deftly tossed the pistol into the grass. Given that all of my personal "canonical six Copycats" either brandished pistols (Heady, McCoy, Hahneman) or had them hidden (Mac, LaPoint, Fisher), I think it's a decent assumption that Cooper had a pistol hidden on his person somewhere, perhaps in the mystery bag. - He's looking forward to going to Seattle for CC. He said the last time he was there was Nov 30th, 1964, which was the date of his Navy discharge. Said his brother was discharged a week earlier from the same Naval air station on Whidbey and hung around waiting for Mac to get out. Once Mac was discharged they bought a clunker and drove home to Michigan. - Mac said he visited airports in Chicago, Detroit, Indianapolis, Cincinnati, and St. Louis, before deciding that St. Louis had the weakest security. - I asked him if he drank or ate anything on the flight, and he said absolutely not. He was concerned they were going to drug him. Seems reasonable that this is why Cooper refused all refreshments as well after the hijacking began. Interestingly, both Mac and Hahneman requested pills and both broke the pills in half and required a crew member to swallow half before they would take the other half.

You know as well as I do that they completely screwed up the descriptions during later files. Nothing can or should be inferred from any of those descriptions. Hell, when they catalogued the museum chute into evidence the description they gave was of Cooper's chute. This is why I think the most reliable description is the very first description. Everything gets conflated and Frankensteined after that by agents who got confused and by Cossey's crap. The very first description of the museum chute, regardless of who gave it, has been shown to be 100% accurate. We know this. Thus, the same degree of legitimacy should be given to the Cooper chute description. Aside from the canopy size being wrong, there is no reason at all whatsoever to doubt that description. None. It was paired with a 100% accurate description of the museum chute, thus it's likely accurate as well, or at least more likely to be accurate than any subsequent descriptions. So all of this talk of who's on first and what's on second and I don't know's on third is irrelevant. We should all roll with the first description as being most accurate. The likelihood of subsequent descriptions being more accurate than the first description is highly unlikely (aside from the packing card and the canopy size). All subsequent second hand descriptions just confuse the issue and muddy the waters. They should be ignored entirely IMO.

I don't think it's unknown though. I've explained to you my thoughts on it and I've explained it sufficiently to my satisfaction. Do you think Hayden used the term "civilian luxury chute"? when he denied and rejected it and said they were both military and "identical". Actually I do think he used that term and and I don't know how many freaking times I have to express to you my belief that I simply DO NOT CARE about what Hayden said 40 years later. Every time you say "he rejected it" you're giving credibility to a 40 year old memory that is contradicted by original source documents. I'm sure Hayden was a nice enough guy and wasn't outright being duplicitous like Cossey, but I have no reason to give more weight to his 2011 statement than his 1971 statement. Reason I think Hayden said that is because we have him a few days later on the 1st of December specifically talking about this harness. For some reason he seemed to give enough of a shit about the harness to even bring it up. Why would he even bring that up? It's not like he was bringing it up for identification purposes. They already knew it was his. It sounds like he's bringing it up to say "I want my parachute back. It has this harness that I like..." (and again, I don't give a crap about what he said 40 years later about it being uncomfortable or whatever). I do lean towards those descriptions being from somebody who handled the chutes before they went on the plane. We already have a description like that in the same document. Comes from Al Lee. He mistakenly says they were both olive drab, but it was night time so maybe he couldn't seem them clearly.

Ok, I’ll continue to disagree, but I’ll go along with it. So what else happened? Speculate.

Why is Stamp of Legitimacy being given to Hayden's forty year old memory of something he probably hadn't thought about in decades before Bruce walked into his hangar? I've already shown his memory to be false. He claims the only time he interacted at all or spoke to the FBI was with the jerk agent who brought his chute back to him. We KNOW this to be false. We have him as a MATTER OF HISTORICAL RECORD speaking to the FBI on 11-25-71, 12-2-71, 2-3-72, 8-8-73, and 8-28-73. Bro, you are a better researcher than to be chasing ghosts around like this.

Since these are descriptions of the chest packs, it's obviously Lynn Emerick. Recall that further down in the document he advises the FBI that he's not sure when Cossey is going to be in that day (to Sky Sports).

My man, this isn't complicated. "We had tried all day (up to 3:30 PM to reach him at his home)" What does that tell you? It tells me that they finally got in contact with him at 3:30 PM. THEN, at 4:53 they fire off the AIRTEL, which includes the first mention of "flat circular". Does "flat circular" appear in Hayden's description? No, it doesn't. Who uses "flat circular" in their description? Cossey uses it during his in person interview on the 26th. So very clearly and obviously they finally talked to Cossey over the phone around 3:30. During that conversation they received some new info from him that complemented Hayden's description, so they just added it to the Hayden description for their 4:53 AIRTEL. You are chasing ghosts. You are using statements made DECADES later by a known liar (Cossey) and a guy who clearly forgot what happened (Hayden) to contradict original source documents. If you JUST stick to the 302's and ignore statements made 30 to 40 years later, the ONLY thing that needs to be explained is why the canopy size and shape is described incorrectly. The original source documents are the best and most reliable evidence in this case, not 40 year old memories. You know this to be the case, otherwise you wouldn't be such a 302 obsessive like I am. With respect, it really seems like you are chasing ghosts and it's causing your head to spin in circles trying to explain why decades old memories don't line up with original documents.

But Halstad and Hayden do not. That 2:50 timestamp is pertaining to Hayden. Think about it. Why would they call the guy who contacted Hayden and ask him how Hayden described the parachutes instead of contacting Hayden themselves? Why would Hayden have even given Halstad a detailed description of his chutes in the first place? Halstad made a phone call. That's his entire contribution to the Cooper case. He's a non-factor. Halstad has no bearing in this case aside from being the guy who said "oh, I know a guy..." There's nothing in evidence to suggest Halstad ever saw the chutes, had the chutes described to him, or that he was even there at the airport that night. So there's no reason to not take that paragraph at face value when it says "Hayden described....". Again, I don't see any reason for this to be this complicated. The person best equipped to provide an exact description of the parachutes would be the parachute owner, which is why they called Hayden for a description. Yes, totally stupid of them to not take photos of the chutes and check the cards, etc. But remember, the FBI were doing their best to be hands off at that point per Nyrop's instructions. As for Cossey, I'm with you on the "flat circular" deal. That document is from the late afternoon on the 25th. It's clear by that point they had tracked Cossey down. The fact that they had to amend the previous "2:50 AM description" to include "flat circular" is the clincher that Cossey had nothing to do with the "2:50 AM description".

Dude please stop this. Hayden provided the initial description. It's in the files. We even have the exact timestamp. Was that line about contacting Hayden at 2:50 AM actually just an excerpt from an agent's novel he was working on? No, of course not. It happened. It wasn't conjured out of an agent's imagination. And you can't honestly expect Earl Cossey to remember that one of the two parachutes he packed FIVE MONTHS earlier had vomit bags in them or that one of the two parachutes had a fray mark down the back? Stop this madness. You're far, far too good of a researcher to be going on like this. I've conceded that "burp sacks" are apparently a thing despite my failure to find evidence for it. It's really not a big deal. So it's ok for you to concede that Hayden misremembered something from forty years earlier when he was talking to Bruce. No one is going to judge you or disrespect you. It's totally OK to be wrong sometimes. We just need to ignore Cossey and realize that the initial description of Cooper's chute is probably the best we're gonna get. All you have to do is substitute Hayden saying it was 28 foot for it being 24 foot and it's fine.

fwiw I told Detlor this on the phone a week or two ago and he was shocked. I've told Larry as well and he was equally surprised. Detlor essentially said they were mostly lawyers back then so they didn't know anything about parachutes or aircraft, etc. They had to rely on others since this case was so far out of the norm for what they routinely dealt with. It's quite interesting looking back and reading that file where they are cataloging the museum chute into evidence and the agent writes, "the identification cards for this are contained in a pocket", while totally oblivious to how abnormal that is. Also, that file is totally bizarre because whomever wrote it screwed up and used Cossey's description for the MISSING chute to describe it.

Ok fine, he's describing his own. So what now? The "Hayden description" is only incompatible because of the canopy size. He never specifies who actually made the thing.

Yes, Cossey is a known liar, etc. So don't listen to Cossey's description. Listen to NORMAN HAYDEN'S description. You know, the guy who literally had them in his possession the DAY of the hijacking. Cossey is remembering a random parachute he packed from five months earlier. Who cares what he has to say about it. He's irrelevant. The only thing inconsistent with the initial description that HAYDEN gave and the packing card is the canopy size. That's it.

You know who else was a PILOT? The guy the FBI said they got the description from at 2:50 AM.

Cool story. Now explain to me how Earl Cossey remembers the fray down the back of a random parachute that he packed five months earlier.

"completely incompatible?" How? You can easily put a 24 foot into an NB-6.

show me some evidence of that and also explain to me why you think anyone would have TWO barf bags on their parachutes?? Ridiculous. Also, you think Cossey would claim or remember five months later that these random parachutes he packed had barf bags? You think Cossey would remember FIVE MONTHS LATER that the museum chute had a fray down the back from metal? No way.

All of this Matrix-style bending over you are doing trying to explain Cossey saying one color and some other guy saying another color and yada yada can EASILY be explained when you realize that Hayden was WRONG when he was describing an event to Bruce Smith that occurred FORTY YEARS earlier. Again, we have the freaking FBI Files. Either they are legit or they are not. And if you don't think they are legit then I don't know why you invest so much time in the FBI Files otherwise. The file says they spoke to HAYDEN (not Halstad, not Cossey, not Mickey Mouse, not John the Baptist) at 2:50 AM. You think some FBI agent playing with his dick just wrote that down for the sure hell of it?? "Ya know, I'm just gonna write some random shit down so a couple losers 50 years later can debate it on a message board." That document very CLEARLY states that they spoke to Hayden. Then we have Hayden speaking to the FBI MULTIPLE times (something he denied). So why are you STILL putting faith in what Hayden's memory is FORTY years after the fact instead of just taking the document at false value? I honest to God cannot comprehend this. Dude, this isn't that complicated. " Further, Norman emphatically declares that he never spoke directly to the FBI during the parachute delivery nor subsequent investigation, yet, the Bureau’s document claims that their detailed parachute information comes from Norman." Hayden implies that the only FBI he ever dealt with was the guy who physically returned the chute to him. That is incorrect. Hayden AND Cossey gave approximate descriptions of the same chute. For whatever reason they were BOTH mistaken on the canopy size. THAT is the only mystery we have about the parachutes at this point. You are making this far, far more complicated than it needs to be.