Robert99

FlyJack, you still do not understand the situation here. So here we go again and please pay attention. The airliner is ALWAYS flying straight into the wind except possibly during takeoff and landings and when the pilot is deliberately side slipping the aircraft. The direction of the winds at altitude does not mean anything in this regard. The winds aloft DO have an effect on the ground path. The pilot has to do some calculations, unless he is tracking a VOR radial or some such thing, to achieve the desired ground path. If the winds aloft are parallel to the desired ground path, then the airliner has a pure headwind or tailwind component. If the winds aloft are at an angle to the desired ground path, the pilot will have to do some calculations, as described above, to determine the geographical direction the nose of the aircraft should be pointed to achieve the desired ground path. But at altitude the aircraft is ALWAYS flying directly into the wind and the configuration of the flaps and landing gear is irrelevant. There is an FAA rule that aircraft are to stay on the centerline of Victor airways. There was no reason for 305 to be three miles off that centerline. It certainly did not have any problem staying on the V-23 centerline south of Portland.

Let me try the simplest answer possible which is "no". Does that answer your question? But the airliner is always flying straight into the wind except in the situations previously mentioned.

There are a lot of other gaps also. I count 19 gaps and, as you point out, some of them are quite lengthy. They are much longer than would actually be the case in this matter.

FlyJack, you are still missing the point here. The airliner was at 10,000 feet and whether the flaps and gear were down doesn't mean a single thing with respect to the wind except that there would be more aerodynamic drag. And it doesn't mean a single thing which way the wind in coming from with respect to the ground except for navigation purposes as explained previously. The wind the airliner sees is always from the nose to the tail of the aircraft, literally right down the center isle of the airliner, except in extreme turbulence and when the pilot is deliberately side slipping the aircraft.

There is no such remark in the Seattle ATC Center's radio communications transcripts that have been publicly released. Consequently, this has to be in the unredacted version of the Seattle ATC Center's radio transcripts which has not been publicly released. And which the FAA and the FBI are sitting on. Since some people on this site claim that there is no unredacted version of those transcripts, I am sure they will be very inventive in explaining away Rataczak's comments.

FlyJack, something seems to be getting lost in the translation here. Once the aircraft leaves the ground, the atmospheric wind direction does not have any effect on the aircraft aerodynamics. The only wind that the aircraft sees is that on the nose of the aircraft and the aircraft configuration is irrelevant. The only time the aircraft aerodynamics and the atmospheric wind interact is during takeoff and landing. Again, visit the FAA site and download some information on air navigation and study it.

Cooper's view forward directly ahead of the airliner would be lousy. He would be looking into about a 225 MPH slip stream that was well below zero degrees F and very difficult if not impossible to keep his head in that slip stream. Here is a true story. I was on the USAF end of the F-16 program as it was transitioning from the YF- demonstrator aircraft to the F- operational aircraft. The program had a F-16 airframe in the NASA full scale wind tunnel in California for testing. One of the questions of interest was what would be the effect of losing the canopy in flight. This canopy was a single piece item without a fixed windshield in front of it. The USAF F-16 program director (two stars) was the test subject in that test. Wearing normal flight gear and exposed to the free stream air flow, he said that he could not function at 180 MPH or so.

FlyJack, once the aircraft leaves the ground the wind is always on the nose of the aircraft. [Exceptions of course are during extreme turbulence and when the pilot is deliberately side slipping the aircraft.] It simply does not matter which way the wind is blowing relative to the ground, the configuration of the aircraft, or if it is being hand flown or on autopilot. The atmospheric wind at altitude does matter if the aircraft is trying to maintain a given ground track. A specific ground track is achieved by pointing the nose of the aircraft in the direction that the atmospheric wind is coming from, relative to the ground desired ground track, by an angle that the pilot has to calculate given the wind aloft speed and direction and the aircraft's true airspeed. And again, I need to repeat for the hopefully last time, anyone interested in aircraft navigation should visit the FAA's website and download and study their free publications on air navigation. Based on my observations, quite a few people on this site would benefit greatly from studying the FAA's superb publications on this subject.

FlyJack, the "FBI" flight path is NOT consistent with anyone flying the aircraft. It wandered up to three miles from the centerline of V-23 and that would not have happened if a pilot was trying to track the centerline which anyone hand flying it would have done. Perhaps Rataczak did hand fly the aircraft, but the FBI flight path does not support this. Also, as I have repeatedly stated, a more accurate flight path could be determined from the Seattle ATC Center data than GEOREF.

FlyJack, you seem to have at least a semi-open mind about the flight path. So, I have some questions after reading your recent post about AFM 51-40. Anyone with actual facts is free to jump in here also. Where and why did the World Geographic Reference System (GEOREF) enter into your thinking about the flight path of the airliner? Please be specific. Why do references to the SAGE system keep popping up when the radar system of the interceptor aircraft (presumably F-106s) was plugged into the SAGE system and interested in determining the flight path of the bandit aircraft relative to itself so it could get a missile lock on it? In all probability, the Seattle Air Traffic Control Center was using information from the same radar station at McChord as the USAF. So, why didn't the FBI just get the flight path information from the FAA? [Actually, the FBI apparently did, and it conflicts with the flight path from the USAF, so the Seattle ATC Center's actual radio transcripts are heavily redacted and not being released to the public.] Personally, I have NEVER seen the GEOREF system used in any flight planning either military or civilian.

Whiskers, thanks for the information on the WSHM chute. I have also been in touch with Shutter on this for several years. If access to the chute is finally granted, please let me and others know before the examination. There needs to be high quality photographs taken of this chute and certain specific areas of the chute in order to assist in determining what type of chute this is or is not. What appears on the packing card is not always accurate. And as I have indicated previously to Shutter, I am willing to help with $ for the examination and any lab testing. Good luck.

Georger, you are actually referring to a post by Dr. Robert Edwards on his blog. This is not an FOIA request that you did.

1. Definitely Cossey as FlyJack points out. 2. It is highly unlikely that any packing card was dusted for prints. The two parachutes recovered from the airliner in Reno stayed there or at the Las Vegas FBI office for some lengthy period of time after the hijacking. They were examined in Reno by National Guard personnel and others. After that, the packing cards were probably so contaminated that looking for fingerprints was a waste of time.

FlyJack is correct. Rataczak's statement was simply redacted from the Seattle ATC radio transcripts. Also, the flight crew had been instructed before takeoff from Seattle to flash their lights for a period of time to alert the chase aircraft that Cooper had jumped. This statement is amplified elsewhere. Further, Rataczak apparently didn't know the exact location of the airliner when Cooper jumped, or he could have passed the information to ATC himself by simply looking at his VORs and DMEs. This suggests that the airliner was not flying directly to or from a VOR station and thus was not on V-23 at the time of the jump.

FlyJack, the above refers to the ARINC teletype transcripts. It is the unredacted Seattle Air Traffic Control transcripts that are needed to determine the flight path. ARINC and Seattle ATC are two entirely different things.

For the benefit of people on DropZone who can read, which obviously doesn't include Georger, I had never heard of the DropZone site in 2008. After the FBI asked for public assistance on the Cooper in early 2009, I got in touch with Sluggo (Wayne Walker) who told me about this site and I joined it in March 2009.

Chaucer, in some of your posts on the Internet you have claimed to be a Zodiac "expert" and you have claimed that a couple of the Zodiac ciphers have already been solved. Your memory seems to be as bad as Georger's.

Georger, if you read the post by OleMiss you should notice that Carr was not posting to DropZone which happens to be this site in case you have forgotten. So as far as I can determine, Carr posted on DZ in 2008 or earlier before Quade locked that thread but not on the later threads which includes the present one.

It appears that Carr was posting on some other site and not this one. Whose site is the D.B. Cooper: Mystery Group? Ulis? I don't believe that I have ever heard of it, but I am not on Facebook or other such social media sites. OleMiss, if you or anyone else on DZ are in contact with Carr I would like to ask him a several simple questions if someone can pass them to him. 1. Have you (Carr) ever seen a copy of the Seattle ATC radio transcripts that didn't have numerous dash lines (like - - - - - -) in it? 2. Why does the FAA refer all FOIA requests for copies of the Seattle ATC radio transcripts to the FBI? It should be noted that a version of the Seattle ATC radio transcripts has already been publicly released as well as a complete version of the Oakland ATC radio transcripts. 3. Why does the FBI FOIA office change names of the requesters to prevent them from appealing to the DOJ? I have had federal licenses since the age of 16, served in the military, and worked for and retired from DOD and they never got my name wrong, but the FBI FOIA office did, and it was deliberate. 4. My congressman (and later Senator) worked through the FBI's Congressional Liaison Office to submit an FOIA request to the FAA which resulted in a referral back to the FBI and an FOIA request to the FBI which resulted in a couple of pages. If the version of the Seattle ATC radio transcripts that has been publicly released is the correct one, what prevents the FAA/FBI from saying so?

Yes, I am well. I wasn't aware of any discussion related to me on this thread last December. Some day if I don't have anything better to do, I'll see if I can find it. But I don't have time to do it now. Chaucer, how is your health? Are you still claiming to be an "expert" on the Zodiac? If so, have you been able to figure out what actually constitutes the Zodiac ciphers? If you are going to solve them, you have to figure out what the ciphers are. At least that seems logical to me, but you may not operate that way.

Georger, you have really got your "facts" wrong. Just about my first post on this site related to problems with the so-called FBI Flight Path. I joined this site in March 2009 but didn't start posting here until I had obtained some related data from the National Archives on the hijacking. I also started another thread about the Cooper hijacking on this site but after discovering that everything about the hijacking was supposed to be on the present thread, I informed Quade about it and he locked it. However, Meso apparently merged the locked thread with this one when he reactivated this one. So, there may be some confusion about post numbers. I had never heard of this site until Sluggo (Wayne Walker) referred me to it and told me how to find it. Sluggo never said a word to me at any time about the Western Flight Path being wrong nor did he make any critical comment about it to me. Your claim that Carr posted criticisms here about the Western Flight Path is apparently just more of your nonsense. I don't remember seeing a single post by Carr on the present thread. By that I mean that while Carr apparently posted on the thread that was locked by Quade in 2008, he has not to my knowledge posted on this thread since then during Quade's or Meso's time as running it. Georger's other comments are just more ducking and weaving.

I have looked at the roll in the Harrison papers. Are you claiming there is a difference in the roll you saw and the Harrison roll?

This original printout that you say you saw, was it still on a roll of paper or was it simply Xerox copies of the original printout?

You seem to have an attitude problem. How many ham sandwiches have you indicted as a prosecutor?

I have done exactly that repeatedly over the last years. It is obvious that you haven't read any posts related to the Western Flight Path or my experiences with FAA and FBI FOIA requests.