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Sluggo, Welcome back!!! Man, you have to make an AFF jump. You are a pilot so you'll land way better than most first timers. Oh, and none of us actually do jump from perfectly good airplanes. When the commuter airlines no longer want em, they fly parcel cargo. When the freight dogs dont want them, the smugglers fly em. When even the smugglers dont want em they get a new coat of paint, some creative logbook entries, some "overhauled" parts with Miami style yellow tags and start a new life as jumpships. When I refer to Miami style, the old timers will know what I mean. A buddy flew a DC 6 with four fresh Miami overhauled props from FL to CA. Over TX, one prop ran away, uncontrollable pitch and overspeed, a very dangerous thing. Quick emergency landing in TX. They pulled the prop and found critical internal parts MISSING from the "overhauled" pitch control unit in the hub. Maybe Quade spanking the forum has had some good results (I HATE to admit that censorship has ANY benefits). It sure is peaceful here now. Not a flame, troll, slam or slur to be found. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I say go with the solid evidence, the found money. Then work back from that point. If the most likely explanation of how the money ends up there (natural non human transport) requires you to move the flight path, then move it. I think it is possible that the mapped flight path is waaay off from the path actually flown by NWA 305 that night. I know there is a huge disagreement on that point. Most think the mapped flight path that the FBI used was very accurate. I do not yet share that level of confidence. Just one slip up, like assuming that the radar antenna installation is centered at the airport, could throw it way off. ATC surveillance radar can be located remotely from the airport and can be corrected for the controller displays to give the airport as the center of the screen. If you were working with raw radar data from the radar installation site you might make a mistake if you thought you were looking at corrected data destined for an airport centered display. There lots of ways that the map could be off, and then again it might be very accurate. Until I know exactly how it was prepared and what data was used, I am not confident that it accurately displayed NWA 305s exact flight path or presumed Cooper exit point. Show me the money! Ok it was shown. Show me the plane! OK, we have the plot map. Hey, the two don't reconcile, whats up with that??? Show me the most likely explanation. Is it human transport of the money post landing or plane map inaccuracy? That's where we disagree. Time for SafecrackingPLF, Sluggo, Zing, Ckret and all the others to rejoin the civil peaceful respectful discussion we are having here under Quade's ever-watchful moderator eye. Hey, Patty Hearst got a Presidential pardon, and she robbed a bank in SF and shot out the front of a sporting goods store in LA with a fully automatic carbine. Be a sport Quade, early parole is requested. The prisoners are rehabilitated and meaningful work awaits them, right here. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Dont tell skydivers how to make a cheap vacuum chamber that an ex could fit in. Baaad idea. My ex is OK, and I don't pay spousal support any more, but there are others out there whose circumstances are quite different. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Heavydude, Many thanks for those very practical tips! That's the kind of stuff that matters but isnt necessarily in the books. Lab Rats rule! 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

You are right, no real need to have one in the field, just a fun thing to play with while waiting for the overcast to clear up. When I watched the one Alti 2 brought to WFFC I saw some altimeters that were way off at higher altitudes but OK at pull altitudes. It wasn't always a constant error. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

SafecrackinPLF, Zing, Sluggo Ckret, and all the rest of you guys, come back! If you are locked up in Quade State Penitentiary come back as soon as you are paroled. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

"Duane -wasn't- DB Cooper. He was his accomplice." Even though I personally doubt that was the case, this is exactly the kind of "out of the box" thinking we need here. I never thought of it. Give us more ltdiver. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

CB walkie talkies were widely available in 1971 and had RF power ranges of 0.1 to 5 watts in the 27 MHz band. Range HUGELY depended on terrain between the two units. In 1963 when I was a kid I had a Lafayette 0.1 watt single channel CB walkie talkie. It wasn't the toy type, it had 10 transistors and a good double conversion superhet receiver. My friend had one too. We could get about half a mile in thick forest, but between high hilltops, we once got 9.3 miles and the reception was quite clear. The 5 watt units would have better range. If Cooper had an accomplice positioned on a mountaintop, and Cooper had a line of sight to that peak, it is VERY likely that they could talk to each other for 10 miles or more with cheap (30-80 dollars) CB walkie talkies of that era. That still leaves a serious problem arranging a rendevous since Cooper could probably not tell exactly where he was. Being able to communicate is not the same as being able to locate. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Glad to see the forum reviving. For sure Winsor is right about the odds. Although I want Cooper to have survived, and cling to the slim chance that he did, that wish doesn't alter the cold hard facts: night jump, cold, rainy, high speed exit, unfamiliar gear, unsleeved canopy, unknown terrain below exit, attached stuff flopping around wildly and possibly obscuring ripcord handle, fear, panic, etc etc. If I were betting even odds, I'd bet that Cooper died that night. I think his death would have been from a no pull, not a landing injury. I think if he deployed he landed alive, maybe injured, but not fatally injured. Pilots very often survived nighttime ejection and landing in rugged territory. That phase has little to do with survival training. Staying alive after landing and finding your way to help has plenty to do with physical condition and training. With 200K possibly sitting in the woods you can bet a lot of locals were looking for Cooper's body. Vultures would almost certainly find a decomposing corpse. They could be your feathered search planes, better sensing gear, better flight characteristics and almost unlimited endurance. I think there is a good chance that if Cooper died, his body was found. There were no Vultures circling the money or the door placard and they were found. A body would have a fleet of black feathered recon aircraft orbiting the impact site for many days. That would attract attention and could be seen from a considerable distance. I think Cooper lost part of the money during his jump, but not all of it. I think if his body were found with money, the money would be taken home or to some other protected place, not buried in the woods. I think the found money got to where it was discovered without any post jump human transport. That means the 727 track map might be inaccurate, but it wouldnt be the first time such a thing has happened. We are NOT looking at a PPI radar screen shot. We are looking at a document prepared by a person and they may have had bad data, insufficient data or made mistakes. I hope Sluggo and Ckret and the other sleuths put aside the past and return to this now peaceful forum. Come on guys, give it another chance. This is primarily entertainment, but in the process of having fun we might figure something out that eluded the original investigators. PEACE! 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

If he was holding on to the briefcase when he jumped, he was not holding on to it after opening shock. Plus, opening shock would have been worse if he were hugging the briefcase, even assuming he could pull successfully with the briefcase in the way. Mark \ \ Are we 100% sure that the briefcase would have been torn from his grip? I think the answer is yes, but nobdy has calulated the forces as far as I know. As far as artists drawings go, I have seen MANY criminal cases where the composite drawings prepared by the artist working directly with eye witnesses had very little resemblance to the actual perpetrator once he was captured. One thing that did seem to be done accurately was the hairline though. They usually got that right. After a while, especially in a notorious case, the drawing BECOMES, in the minds of the public and even some of the investigators, the actual image of the person who did the crime. If it isn't accurate, the criminal must breathe a real sigh of relief. He can go out in public without much worry. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I think a V-9 is 450 cu in or 500 cu in reserve tray; I cannot see why a CYPRES would not fit. Also, are you sure on the Raven 2 and not a Raven 3? I would think that a Raven 2 would be very loose in there. Just a thought, JerryBaumchen Maybe it was a V7? I spoke with Nancy LaRivere (sp?) who looked up the drawings. She told me it was designed to be really thin for Twin Beech loads. Raven 2 was a normal fit so I guess it was not a V9. I went to three riggers all of whom said no way on a Cypres install. I jumped without a Cypres for a while then, with 2 kids, thought better of it and upgraded to a newer rig. I guess I could have tried some other kind of AAD but I didnt since I was planning to upgrade soon and preferred a Cypres in the new rig. I advertised some older square canopies on Craigs List and got calls from kids who planned to tow them like manned kites. I told them how dangerous that was and pulled the ads. I told them that a crash was virtually certain. You know how well kids listen, bet they are still going to try it but at least not with anything bought from me. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

You want an even bigger mystery disappearance? http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/15-08/ff_jimgray?currentPage=all Perfect flat calm weather, big RED sailboat, local trip(SF to Farallons and back), and the guy and his boat just plain vanish. Not a speck of debris was ever found and the search was started quickly. Not skydiving related, but an example of how large objects and people can remain missing even when you have a limited area where they could have met their end. This sailor was well connected in the tech field and his friends put every resource to work to solve the mystery. The USCG flew and sailed extended searches and found NOTHING. I have commercial fished in the Gulf of the Farallons for years and this case baffles me. If he was hit by a freighter there would be lots of debris. If he sank there would be some debris and an oil slick. If he did some fake disappearance scam, a big RED sailboat is not what you'd be sailing. If he sunk in a fishing area, sooner or later someone would get his trawl gear hung up on the wreck in an area shown on the charts as clear and the wreck would be investigated. Oh well, back to DB Cooper. At least we have some traces: the found money and the door placard. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I think Winsor is calling it by the odds, and the odds say Cooper died that night. Still, they find some of the bills in the original bundles and the door placard from the 727, but NONE of the big stuff (canopy, rig, briefcase, dummy reserve, body, etc). That tells me that he might have made it or that someone found his body with some of the money , took the bucks, and buried everything else. I agree with Winsor: the math says he went in... but I hope the math is wrong. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

The Alcatraz to shore swim has been done without wetsuits, but those who have done it are athletes. The water temp is generally between 54 and 60 degrees F. which doesnt sound real cold but believe me, I have gone swimming in SF bay (briefly) without a wetsuit and it feels like you are freezing. There is a slack water period between tides that would be optimal for such a swim. Even if the tidal current is running, you arent swimming directly against it when you head towards SF. It mostly moves you along the waterfront towards or away from the Golden Gate. The Coasties (USCG) tell me that bodies do not always float. If they stay on the bottom for a while, crabs will puncture any cavities that could hold gas from tissue decomposition and refloat the body, then it stays on the bottom and is recycled into your next crab cocktail. Quite a few bridge jumpers are never found. Did the missing prisoners make it to shore? To paraphrase a movie title: No Swim for Old Men 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I got back into jumping after laying off for a while and wanted to start with a used 170. I weighed about 190. A wise man refused to sell me the 170, told me to go really big for at least 30 jumps and then work down in small increments. I started with a Fury 220 and ended up with a Triathlon 190, which has proven to be a fine conservative canopy. If yours is labeled 180 it isnt a Triathlon (unless they once made custom sizes?). Whatever you do, talk with your jumpmaster and rigger before buying or using this rig. I thought I knew what I was doing trying to start with a 170, but I was wrong. Also, don't do any radical turns in the Triathlon until you really know the canopy. On my first jump with my Tri I opened on heading at 3500 ft (last jumper out of a Cessna), yanked hard on a toggle and spun up some line twists really quickly. No prob high up, I just let up on the toggle and kicked them out, but you wouldn't want to have this happen at lower altitudes. Triathlons are really great conservative canopies in my opinion. They are Volvos not Porsches though. If yours does not have the latest mods get them as flare is really improved. If you have the old super skinny lines (used on some Triathlons in the 90s) replace them with a new line set. It took me several incidents with broken lines before I saw the light. My lines were not worn, looked new, just too small or weak. The speed loss with thicker lines was not even noticeable to me (a non swooper). 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

That eBay food storage thing with the internal vacuum pump looks pretty interesting. If it can truly pull 160 mb vacuum that is more than enough to test skydiving altimeters. I guess all I would need to add is a manual switch for the pump and a bleed valve to meter a descent. I think I'll try this before re-inventing the wheel. Thanks for the info! 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I was a pilot rated passenger in the right seat of a Twin Beech that buzzed the airport at the Couch Freaks boogie in Iowa in the early 80's as we departed with a full load of jumpers going back to Illinois. At mid field the pilot executed an unannounced pitch up and barrel roll. During the initial pull-up the jumpers in back ended up against the rear bulkhead, drastically altering the CG. I will never forget the panic in his voice as the pilot screamed at me to help him on the yoke to get the nose back down (up) in the middle of the roll. We recovered with the stall horn screaming and the belly dragging through the corn. That pilot disappeared somewhere south of the border a few years later. Damn, that scares me just reading about it!!! That's about as close a call as I have ever heard about in a Twin Beech. I have heard about a lot of close calls in Twin Beeches, especially when losing an engine on takeoff. I really liked them, but I was young and didn't realize how marginal they were hauling such heavy loads on scorching hot summer days. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Thanks to EVERYONE who responded. Super helpful info!!!! Nice to be on a forum that helps rather than flames. Now I have a much better idea of where to start on my vacuum chamber project. I am going to initially try to make one with a 12 volt vacuum pump from a car cruise control system so that it could be used on the DZ with a small 12 volt battery. Not yet certain if those kind of pumps will pull enough vacuum but if not I'll find one that does. The nice thing about the cruise pumps is that they are so cheap used and very small. Mark 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Wouldn't most riggers refuse to put their seal on gear that has obvious safety issues (e.g. compromised MLW) ? 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Saskia, I guess if you met him post purchase he hadn't jumped it yet. That is NUTS. Hope you straightened him out. I had a guy refuse to sell me a 170 when I was getting back into jumping. I weighed 190. He told me to go really big for at least 30 jumps then work down in small steps. All my prior jumps had been on rounds. He said age as well as weight should be considered in canopy sizing as older people have slower reactions and more fragile bodies. I didnt like hearing that, but he was right. I jumped a 220 and eventually worked down to a Tri 190. No close calls, no bad landings. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Any tips on construction? I have a vacuum pump, some tubing, connectors and valves and some rough ideas. Would like to hear from anyone who has built their own so I can benefit from their successes and failures. Thanks for your help, Mark 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Surely nobody, not even a naive newbie, would pay that much for this old gear... would they??? Do beginners actually spend big bucks on gear without checking with experienced jumpers first? Man, I sure hope not. I was lucky on eBay back in the late 90s when I decided to get active again. The DZ wouldn't let me jump my old rig (PC and round reserve) so I had to get modern gear. Looked on eBay and got a Vector V9? (decent rig but NOT Cypres capable, reserve pack tray too narrow), Fury 220 and a Raven 2 and an Altimaster 2 altimeter all for $350. The gear was old, but in really great shape. Had to get an RSL and BOC conversion but it served me well until I upgraded. EBay is a market for scoundrel sellers, but there are some decent deals on there for beginners once in a while. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Jo, Cops didnt have FLIRS in 71 but military definitely did, I know that first hand. It was pretty classified back then. There were several kinds, real time thermal imagers for helicopters and COIN aircraft and line mapping recon systems carried by spy and recon planes. Those line mappers produced records that were looked at by ground based analysts, not pilots or crewmen. The real time FLIRS were extremely useful in combat and it was important to keep their capabilities secret. Today, if you have about $7500, you can buy a FLIR, not a great one but a usable one. The military FLIRS were very sophisticated and used supercooled detector elements for enhanced thermal sensitivity and reduced noise. The civilian ones use uncooled detectors with much lower performance. If Cooper used flares and there were FLIRS flying in the area while they were burning, he would have shown up, believe me. Even today chemical flares are fired as decoys by planes threatened by IR seeking missles. They are a great IR target. The F 106s scrambled to chase NWA 305 had IRST gear, IRST=infrared search and track. It was useless for ground work and served only to alert the pilot to a hot jet exhaust in its field of view and allow him to track it. It did not present a video type picture. Probably more than you or anyone on this forum ever wanted to know about thermal imaging. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

"Maybe Cooper had a wet suit on under his suit. Cut off at the knees and arms like a "Shorty" of today. Maybe he had a different pair of shoes in his brief case. Along with a compass and some road flares that looked like a bomb." All that is possible, but he'd have been sweating noticeably if he had even a shorty wetsuit on underneath his business attire. Road flares would have been a terrible idea for illumination due to the huge heat signature emitted. If any FLIR (thermal imaging systems) equipped aircraft were looking for him that night, flares would look like thermal beacons. FLIRS were not common in 1971 but they certainly did exist. Hughes Aircraft made them and so did other companies. I have used FLIRS made by Hughes and by Raytheon. Anything warmer than the surroundings shows up as a noticeable hot target. The bigger the temp DIFFERENCE, the better it shows up. Sulphur road flares have a huge delta T over winter ambient outdoor object temps. People have a much lower delta T than anything burning, but are still detectable even when hiding in brush that obscures them visually. You can literally see the heat they emit unless they are 100% blocked by thermally opaque material. A compass wouldnt have been of too much use unless he knew where he was. Knowing which way is North isnt all that helpful if you are in an unknown location. A different pair of shoes would have been a great idea, but more stuff to carry. More suitable jump clothes and jump shoes (parka and hiking boots?)wouldn't have drawn much attention, but perhaps he needed to look like a businessman rather than an outdoorsman when he landed. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

"There probably would have been some reward money, so why go to the trouble of burying him if found?" Simple answer is that you thought you could make more by burying him and keeping the money than you could by preserving all the evidence, calling the police and hoping for a reward. I have no idea what kind of agriculture flourished in that WA/ORE area in 1971, but I know if Cooper did a no pull over rural Humboldt County CA during 1971, there is a zero chance anybody would be contacting the authorities to come over to the impact site and have a look around. 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.