CooperNWO305

Right. He’s in Seattle. There must have been knapsacks available. He didn’t even grab someone’s luggage. Anything might have been better than that bank bag. Georger makes an interesting observation though too.

I think it was Martin who said there were chutes that were orange, green, and white. Orange to signal, white to hide in snow, green to hide in the forest. I remember finding that interesting.

Couldn’t an argument be made that he wanted to get to the ground as fast as possible?

What’s the difference between the two canopies? I’m assuming speed or maneuvering? I’ve been out of touch, but I thought we landed on the chutes being basically very similar. One is newer but smaller canopy. One is slightly older but larger canopy. So to an amateur the differences aren’t much, right?

If Cooper’s body was found and there was $6k missing, the flight attendants would be under the microscope, especially Tina. We do know her brother in law shielded her in a way from publicity. If I was 21 and someone handed me a stack of $, maybe I would have taken it, and then you’re hooked. Flo did say Tina had something to hide, which may be case related or may not be. I’m not a psych, but I’ve talked to a number of them, and they say shame and guilt can oftentimes be at the root of some depression/anxiety. I don’t think Fly’s theory is really that whacky. It’s possible.

Possible it was misread. But that’s exactly how Cary Grant communicated in North by Northwest.

Fly. Are you thinking he landed near Ariel? Good analysis. I have to look at it some more to grasp it all.

I was able to watch the History's Greatest Mysteries. I've definitely seen better shows, but then again any publicity for the case is good. It did drive some page visits to the Wiki page. I feel I looked old :) they did not do makeup. Oh well. Some notes that I am able to comment on now that it has aired. We were told that it would not be scripted, but we were sent a script and when the time came we were really pushed to stick with the script. I found it difficult to recite word for word what someone else has written about a topic I'm passionate about. It was very awkward, and honestly I wish they had just let us read the script instead of trying to say it word for word without any practice. You can see where the CIA woman and the retired US Marshal had more air time than Darren, Drew, and myself. They must have had more experience or are just better speakers under those circumstances. I think I was interviewed for maybe 2 hours to end up with just a few minutes. Also, we were all asked to read most or all of the sections for the show, hence seeing some us sound like we were pro certain candidates. I did not like that. There were certain parts of the Smith section that I knew were just flat out wrong, so I was able to at least not have to say those. The show made it look like Smith and Clair planned the thing together (even building the bomb). That is not really how I saw it happening. Of course the Dick Briggs stuff was odd. The lesson learned for me is to really ask questions before signing on for an interview, but I was happy to be on TV for a few minutes. There are definitely better shows and I hope there will be more. In the end, those companies want viewers and do not cater to the wants of us true aficionados. The crew was professional and I hope they did get out of it what they hoped. Ryan you can post this on the FB group if you want, if you think anyone would be interested, I won't be able to get on there for a bit.

I've been out of the loop for a bit and probably will continue to be for a bit. I may not get to see the History's Mysteries tomorrow night, and was hoping someone can post on here how the part on William Smith goes, if there is a part on him. I'm mainly interested in what they use for pictures of him, like the main one that is the most common of him, or if they got more pics etc. Any other feedback on the show would be interesting too. I won't take it personally, it was an odd kind of wat so to say in terms of the show being filmed. I doubt I'll be able to see any PMs for a bit either. Thanks. Also, I saw a YouTube video from Anthony Mills that mentions Gunther's book was sourced from a guy named Robert Rackley. As far as I can remember, I don't know who that is and have not heard his name. Any info on that would be of interest to me. I did talk to a former radio DJ once who knew Gunther, but don't remember that being his name. As far as I know, no one knows where Gunther got his info. I hope to be back on all the boards in a few weeks. I will be able to see this board though it looks like. Easier than getting it second hand from contacts who don't really know the Cooper background. Lots to catch up on. Hope everyone is well.

It also makes it harder to put on the chute and tie anything. Is there any info that says he delineated between the inside lights and the actual aircraft lights (the blinking ones you see when a plane flies over you at night)? If the outside lights are off, then it makes it considerably harder to visually track the plane.

https://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_posts/23464988-d-b-cooper-and-flight-305-the-air-force-map-revisited

Knowing the DC3/C47 opens it up to a whole lot of military people, especially from WW2. The sheer number of Americans and Canadians who served in uniform at that time is amazing. The flaps setting for him could have been to keep the plane in the air given the configuration, and/or to keep it flying at a low speed. I’d lean towards the flaps setting for him being so the plane would stay airborne just above stall speed.

Anyone have a flight sim for the DC8,9,10,737. A couple months back I had clipped some pics of the cockpits and flight manual for these planes to look at the flap settings. I found 15 degrees was an actual setting on all of these. An aircraft manual might show it too. From my perspective, Cooper did not have real inside knowledge of the 727. He clearly had some time to plan things and seemed meticulous in ways. I expect he would have tried to see a cockpit of a plane, maybe a 727. It’s probably a broken record, but my profile is a guy with some knowledge of aviation, but not a pilot. He does not come across as one. The FBI had him as slightly educated, high school, The Boeing thing just does not die, and in my mind is a red herring at this point. If he worked for Boeing in the Seattle area and stayed there, then law enforcement let a big fish slip through their fingers. The tie has gone from Boeing, to Teledyne to Tektronix to RMI to RemCru, to I don’t know where else.

Two weeks later same deal in Eugene, OR.

Which stewardess was living in Missouri in 1989? I’m assuming Alice. One from Eugene, OR is mentioned later on. This is from 1989, so they were still showing photos then.

We’ve gone down many rabbit holes on this case and have debated topics for what seems like forever, but I don’t remember any prolonged discussion on whether he landed with the money. We’ve talked pull, no pull, lived, died, water landing, etc. Could Cooper have landed with the money ? Mac lost it, Gryder too. What info do we have on these scenarios (20 pound bag, tied with cord)? Even if I was an expert with knots, I’d still not bet on that bag landing with me. Maybe with a real smooth exit.

I concur with Flyjack. Let’s be careful about putting out all these modified sketches. They grow legs and then we have people thinking they are the main ones. Let’s be honest here and acknowledge that the pouty lip pic and push has been because of Vordhal and what looks to be something about his lip. If you’re pushing Vordhal and you’re the one making the sketches, there becomes some bias. This attached 302 looks to me to be referencing the B sketch and indicates a wider nose. Regardless of who Cooper is, I just don’t know too many people who have such nice features as in the B sketch.

You seem to indicate that the pic is perfect and agreed upon by everyone, which it’s not. But I do agree it’s probably close and the best we have. However, there are 302s that indicate the face was too narrowly or the nose not wide enough. Same logic using Mitchell’s comment about the saggy chin. If we are only using the pic then where are Mitchell’s comments? I can’t find “thick” anywhere without getting to a desktop. Anyhow, here is Smith as a young man with his right side of his lip casting a shadow. And as an older guy maybe in his 30s with same lip issues and odd skin under his right chin and neck. Pants pulled up, looking kind of geeky unfortunately. He seems like a plain average guy, on the shy side, would not pass for a tough guy. Some of the minions and naysayers like to discount Smith, but his characteristics do fit quite a bit. I don’t have an issue with disagreement from the experts in that none of us agree on suspects and rarely will you find any of us touting someone else’s suspect. It just does not happen in the case.

Are pouty and protruding from the Roy Rose interview? Does he say thick too? There are 302s that discuss a wider or broader nose, a number of them. The Cooper sketches show a handsome man, at least the B one does. That does not align perfectly with the descriptions, but taken together I feel the B sketch is as good as any case could have, much better than the major cases that come to my mind.

I remember the gray flannel suit site and found it a vortex coincidence that Gunther mentions that movie in his book. Decent old time film with paratroopers.

If the bomb was actually radio controlled (which it doesn’t seem to be) then those would be skills possibly only picked up in the military, in a specialized field. Possibly picked up in the civilian world, but less likely. If he was dealing with just dynamite and an electrical blasting cap, then those are still skills, but could be picked up in the military, mining, blasting for construction/roads, etc. He could very well have known explosives, but still made a fake bomb or just a dynamite bomb with regular electric detonator. At that point he just has to pretend it is more high tech than it is. Cooper comes across as a bit of a story teller/embellisher. Carr said “know it all.” Live wires inside a briefcase makes for good drama, but a simple switch would have been safer for him, albeit less visually dramatic.

Interesting article on the JonBenet Ramsey case, interesting in that it seems that this document shows the actual DNA markers for the family and the possible suspects. One could not load this into a genealogy site, but I think it might be able to be used to verify if someone's DNA matched. Seems odd that this would be published. https://www.foxnews.com/us/jonbenet-ramsey-case-newly-unearthed-documents-reveal-dna-did-not-match-key-players-early-unsolved-slaying

I agree it is more than a novelty but right now the public is mainly only seeing what is in the general news articles, which are talking about kids using it to write school essays (hardly a strategic issue in my mind). Google seems a little rattled though. Good point about criminal records too. Although I don't see Cooper as having a record, we could still benefit from data that shows who was incarcerated at the time, hospital records could show that too for medical or psych issues. One of the Zodiac suspects related to a phone call on live TV was ruled out due to him being in a facility at the time of the murders, although I am a little hesitant to say that Cooper could not have left a facility in the area for a few days of furlough. If Cooper did this today we would of course have a bunch of video, but even if we didn't, just using the data we've been chatting about would help catch him.

A fun way to see AI in action and for a layman is to watch the show Person of Interest. It's been off the air for a while, and of course was for entertainment, but the concepts are there. The other good one is the movie Terminator. :) Hopefully I'll be long gone off this earth before we get to that.

The ChatGPT products I've seen are interesting from a novelty standpoint, but there are other products out there that are more focused on what we would be looking at. Asking a program to determine his personality is not much different than all of us speculating on his personality. AI or any data process relies on the availability of data and access to the data. DNA is a good example. Availability of the DNA is an issue, as we don't know if it even exists. Then comes the access to it, if it even does exist, followed by access to other data such as genealogy sites who have taken DNA samples. Cooper's DNA is no good to us unless we can compare it to other DNA samples. His DNA might tell us ethnicity, maybe likelihood of having certain illnesses, etc. But we really need a full DNA profile, then access to that, then access to other DNA profiles. For me, AI would be great if we had availability of data from 1971 (which we really don't). Time cards of every male in the country, credit card receipts (not common in 1971), medical records (not scanned likely), bank statements, tax records, purchases like a car, etc. In 2023 you could put together quite a bit about a person if you had access to this data, because it does exist, but in 1971 the data just does not exist anymore. Once you had all this, you could then match it up with males of certain ages, etc. and then really narrow down a suspect list. You really don't need AI for it, as there are programs and people that do it now. AI right now is no the easy button, and if it does become that way, then we will be in a scary world. To Flyjack's point, right now it is garbage in/garbage out. There may be one or two revolutionary finds still out there, but I'm not optimistic. The hair sample and maybe DNA from a fingerprint lift are the two that come to mind. Right now we are all still gathering readily available information and speculating. I do think with the right access, the FBI could narrow down suspects using the DNA on the tie, but that requires a lot of changes to our civil liberties, and that just is not going to happen. We may get lucky and have some family member come forward, but that hasn't' happened yet.