Part 46, page 260
DB Cooper-19086Serials 164-325-6
Document date 29 November 1981
FBI 164-81, Vault Part 46 p. 260 (DB Cooper-19086), News clipping, dated 29 Nov 1981, serial 164-325-6 (as read from the transcript) — cooper.theunsolved.net/parts/Cooper-Part-46/pages/260
Transcript
The scan is the source; the transcript is machine-generated from it.
FD-350 (Rev. 12-5-78)
(Mount Clipping in Space Below)
(Indicate page, name of newspaper, city and state.) [illegible]2A Waterloo Courier Waterloo, IA. Date: 11/29/81 Edition:
Title: Character: or Classification: Submitting Office:
---
Legend of D.B. Cooper still alive after 10 years
SEATTLE (AP) — D.B. Cooper, who jumped into legend by jumping out of the back of a jetliner and vanishing with $200,000, probably was an aging, bumbling crook with nothing left to lose, says the man who tracked the myth for a decade.
Dressed only in a dark business suit, white shirt, narrow tie and loafers, Cooper disappeared literally into thin air the night of Nov. 24, 1971, somewhere over southwest Washington. He parachuted out the back of a Northwest Airlines Boeing 727, with 10,000 $20 bills in a bank bag strapped to his body.
He became the first, and only, "suc- cessful" parachute skyjacker in American history. His notoriety helped lead to elaborate airport security systems and redesign of the Boeing 727 jetliner so the rear door can't be opened in flight.
"IT'S CONJECTURE, but I think he was a stupid, desperate rascal, a brutal, unscrupulous man who en- dangered the lives of more than 40 people for money and caused his own death," says Ralph Himmelsbach, the FBI agent assigned to the Cooper case before he retired last year.
"He was very likely an ex-con who was going to make one last, desperate [guess: go] for the big one," the 56-year-old Himmelsbach said. "If he made it fine. If not, he probably felt he had very little to lose."
The FBI feels Cooper's skeleton lies crumpled in the thick forests of southwest Washington. Conceivably, agents say, Cooper is buried under tons of volcanic ash because 150 square miles of the search area was coated by Mount St. Helens' eruption last year.
But no one can prove Cooper isn't
---
An artist's conception of the man known as D.B. Cooper, who jumped into legend by jumping out the back of a jetliner and vanishing with $200,000.
---
164-325-6
---
DB Cooper-19086