# Did D (B) Cooper make it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 26, 2008, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853 "2008-03-26T23:43:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Desert\_Nomad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desert_nomad/32/177_2.png) [@Desert\_Nomad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desert_Nomad)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2008, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/61 "2008-04-04T08:37:15Z")
[QUOTE=Measure for Measure] [Starting in 1966, the Federal Reserve](http://www.newyorkfed.org/aboutthefed/fedpoint/fed11.html) was given the job of destroying unfit currency. [/QUOTE] And today they have the job of just destroying the currency in general. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2011, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/62 "2011-08-01T16:37:02Z")
The FBI has a new lead: [http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/08/01/fbi.db.cooper/index.html?iref=NS1](http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/08/01/fbi.db.cooper/index.html?iref=NS1) ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2011, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/63 "2011-08-01T17:46:54Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > The FBI has a new lead: [http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/08/01/fbi.db.cooper/index.html?iref=NS1](http://www.cnn.com/2011/CRIME/08/01/fbi.db.cooper/index.html?iref=NS1) Actually, the FBI is _claiming_ they have a new lead. In reading the story, … > [@](#): > > The tip, which came from a member of law enforcement, is not expected to be “a big break in the investigation,” Ayn Sandalo Dietrich, an FBI spokeswoman in Seattle, told CNN on Sunday. “We do actually have a new suspect that we’re looking at,” Dietrich told The Telegraph of London, which reported the development in a story Saturday. “… The credible lead is somebody whose possible connection to the hijacker is strong,” she said. “And the suspect is not a name that’s come up before.” > > She told the newspaper agents have sent an item belonging to the person for testing at its forensics lab in Quantico, Virginia. “We’re hoping there are fingerprints they can take off of it,” she said. “It would be a significant lead. And this is looking like our most promising one to date.” So the FBI tells the foreign media about testing they haven’t done yet? Sounds more like the FBI is using the media to go fishing, hoping someone will bite. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2011, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/64 "2011-08-02T03:32:47Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > The New York Fed alone destroys about 5 million unfit notes per day and processes 20 million notes. There are about 11 other Federal Reserve districts as well. The benefits of recording all those serial numbers don’t seem like it would be worth the expense. I’ve seen it being done, in a tour of a Federal Reserve Bank. It was entirely automated. A big sorting machine (reminded me of old punched card sorters) that processed all the bills, sorted & counted them, while automatically dumping ones that were too worn, wrinkled, torn, stained, etc. into a special stack to be destroyed eventually. Meanwhile a scanner in the machine was reading & recording the serial numbers. (I don’t remember if that was for all the bills processed, or only for the ones that went into the discard stack.) It would be easy enough to have run the file of all those scanned serial numbers against a file of all bills that the FBI wanted to locate. (Probably not in real time – this was in the late-1970’s – but easily in a batch process at night.) So this wouldn’t be something special set up for DB Cooper, but a regular process, to watch for bills from hijackings (like DB Coopers), kidnappings, bank robberies, drug buys, etc. – any time where criminals demand ransom money. An easy automated process, with very little added cost. Certainly worthwhile, if it ever gives them a lead on any of these crimes. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2011, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/65 "2011-08-02T03:45:57Z")
> [@Duckster](#): > > So the FBI tells the foreign media about testing they haven’t done yet? Sounds more like the FBI is using the media to go fishing, hoping someone will bite. Possibly. Regardless, Cooper probably didn’t survive his jump, and if he did, he died of exposure in the wilderness shortly thereafter. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2011, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/66 "2011-08-02T05:07:19Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > I’ve seen it being done, in a tour of a Federal Reserve Bank. > > It was entirely automated. > A big sorting machine (reminded me of old punched card sorters) that processed all the bills, sorted & counted them, while automatically dumping ones that were too worn, wrinkled, torn, stained, etc. into a special stack to be destroyed eventually. Meanwhile a scanner in the machine was reading & recording the serial numbers. (I don’t remember if that was for all the bills processed, or only for the ones that went into the discard stack.) > > It would be easy enough to have run the file of all those scanned serial numbers against a file of all bills that the FBI wanted to locate. (Probably not in real time – this was in the late-1970’s – but easily in a batch process at night.) > > So this wouldn’t be something special set up for DB Cooper, but a regular process, to watch for bills from hijackings (like DB Coopers), kidnappings, bank robberies, drug buys, etc. – any time where criminals demand ransom money. An easy automated process, with very little added cost. Certainly worthwhile, if it ever gives them a lead on any of these crimes. Right, all destroyed bills have their Serial Numbers recored and checked. So, altho “Dan” could have spent some of the cash easily without being spotted at first, eventually some woudl have would it down to the Treasury. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/67 "2011-08-03T16:47:53Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Possibly. Regardless, Cooper probably didn’t survive his jump, and if he did, he died of exposure in the wilderness shortly thereafter. The jump has been duplicated a few times for TV documentaries. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/68 "2011-08-03T16:54:49Z")
The DB Cooper jump is popular with Jump Clubs too. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/69 "2011-08-03T16:55:15Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > The jump has been duplicated a few times for TV documentaries. Did they have an experienced skydiver replicate the jump in better weather, or did they really duplicate everything? ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/70 "2011-08-03T17:59:22Z")
[quote=“Marley23, post:69, topic:442853”] Did they have an experienced skydiver replicate the jump in better weather, or did they really duplicate everything?[/QUOTE The program I watched duplicated the jump, including clothes, weather and a night dive at the same time of the year. He also carried a package equal in weight to the money. Thee diver said it was not easy, but was doable. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/71 "2011-08-03T18:05:06Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Thee diver said it was not easy, but was doable. It was not easy, but doable for an experienced skydiver? What do you think that projects to for someone who probably _wasn’t_ an experienced skydiver, based on the fact that he didn’t choose the best parachute and didn’t notice one of the other parachutes wouldn’t work? ---
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/72 "2011-08-03T21:49:45Z")
Before this thread, I’d have thought he bit it, and it was a no-brainer. Looking at some of the sites specializing in Cooper-aphilia, I’m not so sure now. For one, it’s surprising they still don’t have an iron-clad location for where the plane was at the moment he jumped. Sure, you have the flight crew’s impression of the pressure jump and the oscillation of the plane (duplicated in the parachute sled tests), but exactly where the plane was when that happened is not nailed down, better than 90 seconds either way. A lot of it reconciling the flight crew’s notes of the time with the FBI agents’ notes of the time. Further, it’s extremely hard to reconcile the cash discovery at the Tena Bar with him jumping out of the plane and dying in the area of Ariel; they’re different drainages. The Tena Bar is upstream of where the Lewis River runs into the Columbia. I think it’s entirely possible that he jumped into the somewhat cleared farm terrain north of Vancouver, WA, but south of the Lewis River area that occupied the searchers, landed, ditched the chute, and walked to I-5, where he hitched somewhere else. Or made his way to a cached automobile and retraced his steps, retrieving evidence. Another thought is that his altitude restriction was calculated to induce the pilots into choosing a Victor airway (V-23) for the route. With advance knowledge of the route, he’d have a chance of identifying landmarks en route and figuring out where he was. Of course, then you have to explain how he disposed of the money without **any** of it turning up at the Fed Reserve for destruction. That’s a toughie. So, not probable, but more possible than I’d have guessed before looking at others’ impressions. Interesting story. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/73 "2011-08-03T22:32:56Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > Of course, then you have to explain how he disposed of the money without **any** of it turning up at the Fed Reserve for destruction. That’s a toughie. The latest claimant says he lost it in the jump. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/74 "2011-08-03T22:39:16Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > The latest claimant says he lost it in the jump. No, the niece of that claimant says her family told her the claimant told them he lost it in the jump. The guy has supposedly been dead since 1999, although I haven’t found a Social Security Death Index listing for that guy. His name is supposed to have been Lynn D. Cooper. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/75 "2011-08-03T22:43:38Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > exactly where the plane was when that happened is not nailed down, better than 90 seconds either way. Still a finite area, and small enough to search, which it was. > [@](#): > > Further, it’s extremely hard to reconcile the cash discovery at the Tena Bar with him jumping out of the plane and dying in the area of Ariel Only if you assume he stayed conscious during the jump, survived the landing (and the bears), and escaped. If you assume instead (and reasonably) that he lost consciousness due to the cold and thin air as soon as he left the plane, and the stuff he was carrying went flying at however many thousand feet that was, it could have gone anywhere. If you think he stayed conscious and held on all the way down, but was badly injured in the landing or by a bear, then his body parts and his stuff could have been dragged anywhere. Other people have made promising suspects before, but didn’t check out. There’s no reason to think this time is any different. ---
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2011, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/76 "2011-08-03T23:36:27Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Still a finite area, and small enough to search, which it was. > > Only if you assume he stayed conscious during the jump, survived the landing (and the bears), and escaped. If you assume instead (and reasonably) that he lost consciousness due to the cold and thin air as soon as he left the plane, and the stuff he was carrying went flying at however many thousand feet that was, it could have gone anywhere. If you think he stayed conscious and held on all the way down, but was badly injured in the landing or by a bear, then his body parts and his stuff could have been dragged anywhere. > > Other people have made promising suspects before, but didn’t check out. There’s no reason to think this time is any different. Agreed about the small, finite area. Which, compounded with how fast they searched the area, weighs in favor of their finding a body if one were to be found. A human being is a big corpse, as forest corpses go. I’ve seen vulture towers over dead deer and cattle. I’d expect one too for Cooper’s corpse, even considering the mid-November conditions. It’s true, he could have been rapidly dismembered and scattered, but c’mon, it’s Southern Washington, not the Serengeti. I’d actually be blaming a mountain lion more than I would a black bear, if he were turned into food. As far as the height and cold, he bailed out at 10,000 feet. He might have had a headache, but hypoxia would not have been an issue. The outside air temp was, IIRC, above 0 F. At ground level it was about 40-45 F. Unpleasant, but not immediately lethal. The wind blast would have been fearsome, but would have stopped being an issue provided he got his chute open. At that altitude, he’d have about 45 seconds to get his shit together and do so. The pilot reports were of haze and cloud during the SEA-PDX leg of the flight; I don’t remember reading accounts of freezing rain or thunderstorm activity. Again, I think he croaked. If anything, I can see him ending up in the Columbia, a few miles to the west, more than I can imagine him still lurking in the bushes near Ariel. All I was posting was that I was surprised at the small likelihood (as opposed to nonexistent) that he could have actually pulled it off. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/77 "2011-08-04T00:16:20Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > No, the niece of that claimant says her family told her the claimant told them he lost it in the jump. The guy has supposedly been dead since 1999, although I haven’t found a Social Security Death Index listing for that guy. His name is supposed to have been Lynn D. Cooper. “The last claimant to have knowledge of Dan Cooper says he lost it in the jump.” Happy? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_The\_Head](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce73a5/32.png) [@Edward\_The\_Head](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_The_Head)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/78 "2011-08-04T01:00:23Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > The guy has supposedly been dead since 1999, although I haven’t found a Social Security Death Index listing for that guy. His name is supposed to have been Lynn D. Cooper. With the SSDI you may not find anything because someone has to make a claim against the SS number before it would show up there. He might have been a federal employee or something like that who didn’t draw SS. There is a [Lynn Doyle Cooper](http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=cooper&GSfn=lynn&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=30900984&df=all&) at Find a Grave who died in 1999. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/79 "2011-08-04T01:55:32Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > …Another thought is that his altitude restriction was calculated to induce the pilots into choosing a Victor airway (V-23) for the route… What’s the vector, Victor? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2011, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853/80 "2011-08-04T01:56:53Z")
The story of the claimant (to have knowledge of “D B” Cooper, who was allegedly his niece) that his brother was waiting on the ground with a radio (and presumably blankets, hot coffee, food and transport) to find him is interesting. Could he get into the baggage area of that plane? Could he toss the parachutes out the back and climb into a crate he had shipped to be on that flight? And accomplice could pick the crate up at the airport. Probably too obvious. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-d-b-cooper-make-it/442853.md?page=5)