Robert99

Chaucer and Georger, it has also been repeatedly pointed out to you over the last 15 years that there is plenty of evidence of redactions in the Seattle ATC radio transcripts.

Chaucer, you are claiming that I have to produce the unredacted Seattle ATC radio transcripts before you will believe that they have been redacted. Only the FBI/FAA can produce those transcripts. Your plea for "some evidence" means that you do not have the slightest understanding of my previous posts on this matter.

Chaucer, I will explain this again and for the last time so please pay attention. 1. The FAA (Federal Aviation Agency) is mandated to maintain records related to aviation accidents and incidents. These are public records and I have seen some of them that were at least 70 years old. These records include Air Traffic Control radio transcripts, flight and cockpit recorder records, and any other relevant records. 2. The FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) does not normally get involved in aviation accidents or incidents unless criminally is a factor such as in the Cooper hijacking. The FBI would have access to all FAA records related to the Cooper hijacking and would control their release while their investigation is ongoing. This does not mean that the FBI is going to release all of the records or even all of a specific transcript. 3. I filed an FOIA request for Cooper hijacking records with the FAA field office in Redmond, WA. I promptly received a reply, by registered mail with return receipt requested, that consisted of a full page of FBI contact information and nothing on the hijacking. 4. An FOIA request was then filed with the FBI FOIA office which I discovered was an expert at giving the run around and stonewalling. My US Congressman worked through the FBI Congressional Liaison Office to get the FOIAs, plural by this point, moving properly again. The end result was that I received two brief paragraphs of information related to the Cooper hijacking and they are posted on Shutter's site. 5. At no time did the FBI or FAA claim that the Seattle ATC radio transcripts had already been released. And at no time did either organization claim that they did not exist. At no time did either organization refer to the redacted transcript document of the Seattle ATC radio transcripts. 6. The Oakland ATC radio transcripts are textbook examples of air traffic control communications in 1971. If you want to see how the unredacted Seattle ATC transcripts should look, all you have to do is read the Oakland transcripts. 7. It is rather odd to me that while the FBI asked for public assistance on the Cooper hijacking, they apparently seemed to prefer military assistance rather than civilian assistance. For instance, the FBI asked two military navigators nothing about flight paths but only to predict the Cooper landing area based on information provided by the FBI. There were probably several hundred skydivers in the Seattle area that were better qualified to predict the landing zone than military navigators. 8. And what happened to all the data that Soderlind and NWA personnel generated on flight paths, landing zones, and so forth? They certainly had access to all the flight path information and were probably the best qualified group of people to interpret it. 9. Etc., etc..

Chaucer & Georger, please enlighten me on how many years experience each of you have in communicating with air traffic control facilities and listening to air traffic transmissions? Also, if you feel that the Seattle ATC transcripts are complete, you should inform the FBI headquarters. In my involvement with the FBI, which includes senior FBI officials and assistance from my US Congressman, they have never made such a claim. And their actions have repeatedly indicated that the Seattle ATC transcripts which have been released are redacted. The Oakland ATC transcripts appear to be complete.

You are mistaken again. It has been pointed out repeatedly that efforts to obtain the unredacted Seattle ATC radio transcripts end up at the FBI with very little if anything being released. The FAA is mandated to retain such transcripts but efforts to get them from the FAA are rerouted to the FBI. There is nothing secret about the transcripts since anyone with a VHF radio receiver could listen in on them during the actual hijacking.

Chaucer, you are mistaken. All you have to do to understand this is to compare the Seattle ATC transcripts with the Oakland ATC transcripts which are textbook versions of how actual radio transcripts from the 1971 era looked. This has been pointed out on this forum for about the last 15 years. Also, if you had any experience communicating with ATC Centers or FAA control towers in the 1971-time frame, you would already know this.

It would also be nice if the FBI permitted the release of the Air Traffic Control communication transcripts between the Seattle Center and the airliner. It should be remembered that the Air Traffic Control communications transcripts between the Oakland Center and the airliner were released decades ago.

You seem to be suggesting that we can rule out Cooper being an "aviator" and possibly being a "bluesman". I have seen plenty of bluesmen wearing wrap-around dark colored glasses, but I wouldn't call them sunglasses since they usually only wore them on stage during performances in near pitch-dark clubs.

Olemiss, there was nothing unusual about the type of sunglasses that aviator's used from WW2 through 1971. They all had metal frames and various tints with emphasis being on "true color" tints. There was nothing exceptional about their prices either. I have been wearing "aviator sunglasses" longer than I can remember, wore them yesterday, and will be wearing them again today if the sun is shinning when I go outside. So please don't start claiming that Cooper had some exceptional or exotic sunglasses. That is nonsense.

I'm older than everyone. The most experienced skydiver I knew in the early 1960s held a B rating with about 200 jumps.

Sixty years ago, we only had access to surplus WW2 equipment. I always made certain that both reserve snaps were properly closed when I jumped. Nevertheless, one of the snaps would probably come open on about half of the jumps. Some jumpers would drill a small hole in the snaps and insert a pin to make sure the snap couldn't come open. This happened before modern equipment designed for skydiving was developed. Even the Para Commanders were in the future.

Here is a true story related to the above. My skydiving instructor in the early 1960s, who was also a rigger, wanted to jump his chest reserve and didn't have a backpack that he could pack as a legal reserve (this couldn't be done with our modified backpacks). So he decided to jump with his usual skydiver rig and just open the reserve rather than the backpack. When he opened his chest reserve one of the snaps came unfastened and he couldn't get it refastened. Fortunately, there was/is a strong web between the two snaps, and he made it down with no problems. His rigger's logbook contains my signature for a ride down on what may have been the same reserve that he used that day.

FlyJack, you say that you have the data I am talking about. So just exactly what do you disagree with in that data? Again, that data DOES NOT support your claims. You need to get the FAA publications I have been telling you about for years and read them so you have at least some idea of what is going on here.

FlyJack, the data I refer to is already online here, as you presumably know, and most of it has been here for about the last 15 years. On the balloon data, just exactly how far from its launch site do you think it was when it reached 10,000 feet? And exactly where do you get the idea that the wind at 10,000 feet was from the S or SE?

FlyJack, I know you will continue to deny this, but all records show that the wind direction at 10,000 feet, both measured and forecast, was from the southwest (225 degrees true) during the evening of the hijack. And the airliner was at 10,000 feet. The ground winds don't mean anything since the airliner wasn't on the ground. I would suggest that the Weather Underground site might be a better source for the ground weather since it uses the government weather data.