olemisscub

The ATC transcripts would seem to indicate it was Cooper's idea.

I'd argue that he wanted stairs down upon take off for two reasons: 1) It would ensure that he wasn't trapped 2) It increases the distance that the authorities would have to search for you because they'd have to assume he jumped anywhere between takeoff in Seattle and landing in Reno; he wasn't aware the pressure bump was going to give him away, obviously.

I’d be interested in seeing that. Perhaps FlyJack could find that as well. I just looked through her 302’s and couldn’t find it. In both of her 302’s this is the initial demand from Cooper.

I’m aware of what you’re saying. He even says “they can lower it from the cockpit” (obviously incorrect and maybe a brain fart thinking it was like a C-130) However, what Fly is saying is that Cooper First wanted stairs lowered AFTER takeoff Then wanted stairs lowered BEFORE takeoff Then wanted stairs lowered AFTER takeoff. If you read it verbatim that is the correct sequence of events. So I was asking him if there was anything else other than the one communication I highlighted to indicate he ORIGINALLY wanted stairs lowered after takeoff (because neither the witness statements nor anything in the ATC logs indicate this initial desire for stairs to be lowered after takeoff)

So Harrison writes "lowered in flight" as opposed to "lowered after takeoff". Is it possible that this is a misinterpretation and what 305 was actually saying was "hey this guy wants us to be flying with the stairs lowered while we are airborne (after takeoff)". The next communication about the stairs comes from flight ops saying "don't worry about it, you can fly with the stairs down". I agree with your timeline if you read it literally, but the fact that we are missing the part of who chose to put the door down, coupled with Rat and Tina saying he wanted door down from the get-go, makes me think there might be a miscommunication or misinterpretation happening. Is there anything else that would indicate that he originally wanted stairs lowered in flight other than that one sentence?

I assume that your theory would require that he arrived at PDX via an inbound flight, perhaps the same day or the day before? One would traditionally assume that he jumped where he did to be near where his original transportation was, but if your theory is that he intended to jump far away from Portland then that presumes that he didn't have any ground transportation waiting for him at Portland.

I do agree with you on the timeline now that I've really taken the time to look at it. Interesting. I've never really dived into the ARINC much, but it does seem like he initially wanted stairs lowered AFTER takeoff in his initial demand. That's not indicated by anyone's testimony, but the ARINC seems pretty clear. And to your point that I quoted, I can't find anything that indicates who suggested door down either, it's like all the sudden they are discussing the door being down. I assume it was Cooper's idea since he appears to be the one bitching about it when informed that it wasn't practical. I'm unclear about what this "insistent with stairs in 1 deg" means.

How do you square that with both of Tina’s 302’s and Rat’s 302 which makes that whole scene appear to be them telling Cooper that takeoff couldn’t be done safely with door down and that this is what made him change his mind, ultimately resulting in him demanding that Tina stay behind. In your scenario he has an epiphany once they decide on Reno, making it wholly his idea to change his mind about the stairs. The way they tell it they are basically having to twist his arm about it and he only begrudgingly accepts it and isn’t too happy about it. Just curious how you square that since they seem to be disparate scenarios.

Either he’s truly ignorant of basic Cooper facts (no D-rings) or he knows better and is incompetent at pulling off a hoax (failing to ensure that the planted chute didn’t have D-rings). Which do you think?

We don’t even know if any of these statements are his words verbatim, so what a fruitless exercise this is. Even if we were certain that they were verbatim it would still be fruitless.

for anyone wondering, it wasn't the DC Crime Lab that destroyed the cigs, but Vegas at some point when they got them back. This indicates that DC sent Q1 back to Vegas after testing.

Wasn’t Tom Kaye identified as having his DNA on some Cooper item?

It's page 264

I'm referring to the passengers: Bill, Gregory, Spreckel, Lab, and House.

We have the "canonical five" plus I'm quite certain I've ID'd Richard Simmons' statement (Vault 22, Page 4). We're missing the rest of these. We do have two that have yet to be ID'd, which are in Vault 22, page 3 and page 5. I've not come across any other unidentified witness statements from that night in the Vault. Maybe FlyJack has.

This Derham guy was a midwestern skydiver. From Chicago Tribune in 62

Yes, I understand what Q1 and Q2 are and I understand that Vegas destroyed Q1 at some point (DC did not destroy them and sent them back to Vegas in 71). I'm just hoping there is an official 302 from Vegas in 71 (or whenever they destroyed Q1) saying they destroyed it. So far the closest we have to that are these docs.

Indeed. I’d like to see more 302’s regarding the hair slide. The last time it pops up in a 302 is 1985. It’s called “Q2” in the 302’s. Also, 302’s of the missing passenger interviews. We are missing about 10 of them. Also, the 302 from Vegas to Seattle confirming that they destroyed the cigarettes. Should be from 2002-2003 time frame.

I can see why they might be interested in Catalano. He bears a close resemblance to KK5-1.

This Arthur Denham guy that they went to all this trouble to DNA test was 5'9, blue eyes, and was 38 at time of NORJAK. FBI was in love with these young kid suspects apparently.

Yes, we're both going off the same item numbers. Pure titanium with that much antimony sticks out like a sore thumb. The specialized metals industry moved away from creating TiSb alloys in the late 50's and moved to TiSn alloys, which are much more efficient and easy to mass produce. Ulis figured out that Rem-Cru was one of the companies creating TiSb alloys in the 1950's and he just started with them. However, other companies were doing that as well in the 50's. So our team looked at the research departments of those companies like TIMET, DuPont, Batelle, Wa Chang. We weren't getting anywhere and there was still the nagging issue of how would something from the 50's end up on 1964+ clothing. Then after an exhaustive search of the patent databases, Broer ended up only finding two patents during the tie era that showed someone creating alloys by compounding TiSb.* One was Sprague Electronics out of Massachusetts. Their patent also ended up just being an experimental patent and was never put into any product, so it never left the lab. Then there was the Milton Vordahl patent from 1965. So that led us back to checking out Rem-Cru. Our team built an exhaustive list of everyone we could find who worked in the R&D department at Rem-Cru from 1955 until NORJAK. We went through the list and used Ancestry and obituaries and whatever to vet these individuals. What we were looking for primarily were men from the PNW and military men. Literally the only individual of all these names who had PNW ties was Vordahl himself. Then in researching him many things began to click (aviation knowledge, anti-social behavior, knowledge of the area, etc) and it was like a month into it that we found a photo of the guy and felt the resemblance was close enough to warrant further consideration. Had he looked like Chris Farley or something or if his measurements on his draft card didn't fit certain parameters we'd have moved on. What Eric did was quite a bit different. We gave him the name and number of the only guy still living on this list and Eric called him and asked who he worked with who was tall and about 50 in 1971 and the guy said it sounds like you're describing Vince Petersen. So we ended up coming to our suspects via the same origin but through different methods. Also, if you're wanting the particles to match the patent that's a fools errand. The patent doesn't call for a specific formula, plus even if it did have a specific formula we'd have no way of knowing when in the experimentation process those particles got on the tie. The takeaway from the patent is that it allows up to 18% antimony and the antimony readings on those particlesare 16.8%, 16.9%, and 17%. The next highest antimony count on the whole spreadsheet is 10% and it only shows up with 5% titanium, so it obviously can't be an alloy. Personally, I'm not sure if Petersen ever would have come into contact with this patent. He and Vordahl worked at different research labs for Rem-Cru. Vordahl worked at their Midland lab and Petersen at their Robinson lab. Also, as I believe Kaye has pointed out, the patent holder themselves would probably be the only person coming into contact with the patent materials if it was just an experimental patent that was never developed or produced, which is what this was. *major caveat being that just because something doesn't show up in a patent doesn't mean other people weren't messing around with it, but the patents are as good of a lead as any since it means we know unequivocally that these individuals were working with it.

I decided against doing that. You bring valuable insights to the table sometimes that I would hate to miss. I've decided it best to just not interact with you anymore, that's all.