SkydiveJack

Thanks for the photo. That one got saved. I fancied myself pretty knowledgeable about B-17's (my dad flew them and I got married next to on) but I never knew about this one. Cool!

I don't believe everything I see on TV.

Jerry! What the hell do you think your doing posting facts here?

This Dragon Rapide? How the heck did someone land inside the plane (without doing an intentional plane-to-plane transfer? ltdiver If I remember correctly it was a formation load and one plane got under the other. The Dragon Rapide had a fabric fusalage and and he went through it. Ouch!

Hey Ckret, I have a question about the money Cooper received. I understand that every serial number of every $20 bill had been recorded prior to the money being handed over. And I understand that not one single bill of this money has ever surfaced in general circulation. 1. What was the procedure for looking for these bills? 2. Are they still being looked for? If not, when did the checking stop? Edited to remove typo.

OK, so let's say it's a fact that it was in the news well before the jump. If there was a news crew at the airport do you think the police let them get close to the plane? Like where they could have been seen by Cooper? I kind of doubt it. And some people need to be reminded that there were no cell phones back then. So again, my point is simply that if Mayfield was Cooper and he made a call to Hemilsbach 1 & 3/4 hrs. after the jump he had to be- 1. Extremely lucky to be so close to a phone. 2. 100% sure the story was in the news or else he would tip his hand. Ckret, is it correct that the time line of Mayfield calling Hemilsbach was 1 & 3/4 hrs. after the assumed jump time?

Yes he could have gotten lucky and landed near a road and a phone. But my point is that if Mayfield didn't know 100% for sure that the hijacking was already in the news he would have implicated himself by calling the guy the FBI. Again, I not trying to say Mayfield is or isn't Cooper. I'm just pointing out a consideration about the phone call that we know he made.

Don't let their mistake tempt you and get you in trouble. Don't touch the money. Call them ASAP and tell them what happened. You know it's not yours. If you try to keep the money it will come back and bite you in the ass. I know this isn't what you want to hear but it's the right thing to do. Edited to add: One other thing. You have just admitted in a public forum that you know it was a mistake and you stated the exact amount of the mistake. You have just given them the rope to hang you with. Think about it.

Another thing to consider about Mayfield calling in to the FBI. How was he sure that the news about the hijacking had already become public? What if the authorities had kept it under wraps initially? I know the chances of the authorities keeping it quiet in the beginning are small, but what if? If he was out in the boonies and just got to a phone he was really rolling the dice. If the news wasn't public then the call would have implicated him. However if he was home or in a car with a radio he would know about the reports and decided to establish a real alibi before the FBI came knocking on his door. I'm not trying to say he's not Cooper. This is just food for thought.

Money talks, bananas walk.

So if I have this right, the monkeys pick nits before sex. With humans the nit picking starts after sex.

Let's try P-39 AeroCobra.

OK guys. That's enough. Get a room or something!

I don't know the correct spelling but it is one of the Soviet Ukranoplanes. High speed jet powered ground (or water) effect transport ships.

Please note that there was only two minutes between your first post and my answer.

Boeing B-15

I wonder what they were using for bait?

Is that the Beaver that flew in Baldwin in the mid 1980's?

I remember that. It was a US Customs OV-10 that was chasing a small twin engine drug runner aircraft at night. The drug runner apparently figured out that he was being followed and landed in a very short distance at DeLand, got out and ran. The Customs plane was landing right after him and couldn't stop in time. Chopped the drug plane all up and sprayed cocaine all over the runway.

I noticed you called it "a brief romantic interlude". Don't be embarrassed, they have pills for that now.

Hey Zing, is that you in photo #3?

Just take the end walls off the house and call it a covered bridge!

Looks like Mark Borghurst on the engine. Dave & Mark flew me safely on hundreds and hundreds of loads. Great guys!!!

You say he packed all four chutes. Am I correct with the understanding that one of the reserves was a training reserve? Because basically there really isn't a parachute in there and it is closed up by anyone involved with training at the DZ. So if you are using the word "packed" or "packing" in regard to this particular container you might have a misconception about what it actually is. See my previous post.

I want to clarify something. The chest mounted training reserves used back in the day were not sewn shut. The container had a ripcord that could be pulled and inside the container was usually about a ten foot section of a sleeve that was stuffed with some soft material and sewn shut. This represented the reserve parachute. Then there was a handful of lines sewn to one end of this representative parachute and they attached to the risers or were sewn into the container. The instructor could quickly stow this stuff back inside the container and re-install the ripcord. These devices were normally soft and squishy because they didn't really fill the whole container and made it easier to quickly close it. They were normally well marked as a training device not to be used for jumping and if you compared it to a real reserve container you could at least tell that they were different in bulk. Ckret just said Cooper tried to put the money in the good reserve container. This bit of information has me confused, again! But he didn't answer my question asking if the dummy reserve was found in the aircraft or not. Any gear missing from the plane could have been thrown out as a decoy and wasn't necessarily carried or worn by Cooper when he jumped.