Part 77, page 134

Transcript

The scan is the source; the transcript is machine-generated from it.

'usually short, half-hour flight circled and maintained a holding pattern, as the captain calmly informed passengers that traffic at Seattle-Tacoma was delaying their arrival.

As flight 305 circled over Seattle, D.B. Cooper sat alone, wearing sunglasses during most of the flight, chain smoking and ordering two bourbons and water.

On the ground, the FBI immediately began searching for any information that could tell them who D.B. Cooper was. Without a psychological history of the hijacker, the airline decided that for the safety of the crew, passengers and civilians in the vicinity, all his demands would be met. Authorities quickly collected the ran- som money from several local banks and rushed two military rigs from McCord Air Force Base in Tacoma to Sea-Tac. But when Cooper learned authorities had provided military rigs, he said they were not acceptable and demanded state-of-the-art freefall rigs.

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Meeting the Demands

That evening, skydiver and master parachute rigger Earl Cossey of Washington received a telephone call from a business associate who also happened to be the manager of Sea-Tac International Air- port. The airport manager asked for two backpacks and two chest- pack parachutes as soon as possible—but couldn't disclose the reason. Cossey admits he wondered about the manager's request. "But I trusted him completely and did as I was told," he says.

Cossey phoned the local drop zone at Issaquah, Washington, and had a skydiver staying at the drop zone's loft collect the parachutes and hand them over to authorities. He gave them two of Cossey's personal backpacks—one freefall rig and one Navy emergency NB-8 backpack—and two of the DZ's chest packs. The parachutes were rushed 30 miles in a patrol car from the drop zone in Issaquah to Sea-Tac International Airport.

In the meantime, flight 305 continued to circle for two hours above Seattle, waiting for the ransom money and parachutes to arrive. Although the captain and flight attendants calmly reassured passengers it would be only a little longer, some passengers had already suspected something was amiss.

When flight 305 finally landed at 5:45 p.m. in an unlit and secluded area of the airport, passengers were told to remain seated until they got further instructions. As they patiently waited in their seats, the 36 passengers watched as the flight attendant walked down the aisle with a large money bag and parachutes. Cooper then released all passengers and crew mem- bers, save for the pilot, co-pilot, flight engineer and one flight attendant. As the lone jet fueled and prepared for takeoff with five people on board, sharpshooters surrounded the 727.

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Into the Night

Cooper instructed the pilots to fly to Mexico City in the following configuration: at an altitude no higher than 10,000 feet, no faster than 170 knots, landing gear down, flaps at 15 degrees and with the rear stairway lowered.

Once the hijacked jet took off, Cooper instructed the flight attendant and pilots to remain in the cockpit. The flight attendant was the last to see Cooper. She said he was "tying something around his waist."

Cooper demanded that the pilots fly the 727 manually, and their speed of approximately 170 knots came very close to the stall point. All air traffic for the entire northwestern United States was alerted of the hijacking and diverted from the area. However, two Air Force F106 fighters, a T33 fighter jet trainer and FBI agents in a helicopter trailed the 727.

During the flight, Cooper opened one of the reserve packs, removed the canopy and cut two lines off, perhaps to use as a rope to tie the money bag around his waist. The $200,000 in $20 bills totaled 10,000 individual bills, weighing 21 pounds.

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WANTED

A BULLETIN FROM THE F.A.A.

...Following is in [illegible] appeared at the hijacker who received $200,000 from Northwest Airlines on November 24, 1971.

DAG MAN IS DESCRIBED AS FOLLOWS

Race . . . . . White Sex . . . . . Male Age . . . . . Mid 40's Height . . . . 5'10" to 6' Weight . . . . 170 to 180 pounds Build . . . . Average to well built Complexion . . Olive, Latin appearance, medium smooth Hair . . . . . Dark brown or black, parted on [illegible], normal style [illegible] . . . . Possibly brown Eyes . . . . . . Family brown. [illegible] half part of [illegible] Voice . . . . . Low, spoke intelligently, no particular accent, [illegible] born [illegible] citizen of U.S.A. Clothing/marks . Heavy smoker of [illegible] close to [illegible] Warning Append : Black rain[coat/jacket], narrow black tie, white shirt; dark [illegible] [illegible] or dark [illegible] [illegible]

This FBI bulletin shows a composite sketch of the sought-after hijacker.

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It was approximately 8:15 p.m., and the northwest was experi- encing a heavy rain storm with occasional snow flurries, winds up to 80 knots and temperatures of 20 degrees at altitude. Wear- ing a long, flat backpack parachute and chest-mounted reserve over his business suit and slip-on loafers, Cooper descended the lowered aircraft steps. Investigators believe he held onto the hand rails and stood on the stairs at 10,000 feet in the wind and rain for up to two minutes—before jumping into the night.

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The Missing Man and Gear

The Northwest Airlines co-pilot politely and repeatedly informed Cooper over the intercom that they had to refuel in Reno before continuing. It was only after they landed that the crew discovered that Cooper, the money, his briefcase, raincoat and one backpack and reserve parachute were gone.

The fighter jets and helicopter that had followed the hijacked 727 in the stormy conditions never saw or picked up on radar any sign of Cooper or a parachute. As for the alleged bomb, it too was gone. According to the flight attendant's description of the explosives, the FBI suspected that the bomb was a replica, though they could not say for sure.

That evening, rigger Cossey heard on the news that there was a hijacking in progress. Stunned at the revelation, along with the fact authorities had just requested his parachutes, "I thought, 'Oh, crap! There go my parachutes!' " Cossey recalls. "I was just laugh- ing at the stupidity of the guy and thought, 'This guy's nuts.' "

After the jet landed in Reno, Cossey received another phone call from authorities and learned exactly which parachutes they gave to D.B. Cooper and which parachutes Cooper had left on the aircraft. "The skydiver staying at the loft had grabbed two of my personal backpacks and two chest packs from the drop zone," he says. "One was my B-4 sport rig, and the other was my Pioneer NB-8, a Navy emergency chute used for pilots."

It was only after the aircraft landed that authorities also

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PARACHUTIST - NOVEMBER 2003 · 33 DB Cooper-33730