Thread by @DavidZabinsky

50 years ago, this week:

Dan Cooper boards Flight 305 for a 30-minute trip from Oregon to Washington.

But this was no ordinary flight.

It involved an 8-cylinder bomb, a $200,000 ransom, two parachutes...and a jump.

A thread on the only UNSOLVED plane hijacking in US history:

Our story takes place on November 24th, 1971.

A well-dressed man identifying himself as "Dan Cooper" takes his seat in 18C aboard a Northwest Orient Airlines flight in Portland, Oregon bound for Seattle, Washington.

Shortly after takeoff at 2:50pm, he orders a bourbon and soda.

Cooper then passes stewardess Florence Schaffner a note.

Schaffner, who'd been hit on by passengers before, assumed it was just a love letter of sorts and put it into her purse without even reading it.

Cooper whispered:

"Miss, you'd better look at that note. I have a bomb."

In shock, Schaffner sat next to Cooper, asking for proof.

He opened his briefcase from his seat, showing Schaffner what seemed to be eight red cylinders, “four on top of four”, attached to wires and a large battery.

Cooper then stated his demands:

•$200,000 in "negotiable American currency”

•Four parachutes

•A fuel truck in Seattle to fill up the plane upon arrival

Schaffner then moved to the cockpit to inform the pilots.

When she returned, Cooper was in 18C wearing dark sunglasses.

From the cockpit, Captain William A. Scott, seen here, informed Seattle–Tacoma Airport.

As law enforcement prepared Cooper’s ransom money and parachutes, Scott circled for two hours in the air, explaining to other passengers on board they had a "minor mechanical difficulty".

Cooper, all the while, was quite relaxed.

“He was thoughtful and calm all the time,” one flight attendant said.

"He wasn't nervous. He seemed rather nice.”

Cooper even ordered a second bourbon and offered the staff his change as a tip.

As Flight 305 slowly made its descent, a scared and confused stewardess Tina Mucklow (seen here) asked Cooper if he had a grudge with Northwest Orient Airline.

His response?

"I don't have a grudge against your airline, Miss. I just have a grudge."

At 5:24pm, still in the air, Cooper was told his demands had been met.

10,000 $20 bills and two civilian parachutes were waiting for him at Seattle-Tacoma Airport.

At 5:39pm, with the aircraft’s window shades down to deter police snipers (Cooper’s request), Flight 305 landed.

Once grounded, Cooper used Mucklow as his proxy.

She received a bag of cash and parachutes from Northwest Orient employee Al Lee via the aft stairs and from there, Cooper allowed the 35 other passengers and two other flight attendants to disembark.

With the plane emptied out except for Cooper, Mucklow, the two pilots, and one flight engineer, Cooper asked for the jet to be refuelled and then gave the cockpit very specific instructions:

•Take off with the rear door open and staircase extended (to which Northwest Orient objected)

•Fly towards Mexico City at the minimum speed possible (100 knots) at the lowest altitude possible (10,000 ft)

•Stop in Reno, Nevada for refuelling...if required

At 7:40pm, Flight 305 took off, with two F-106s on its tail.

Whilst mid-air, the cockpit felt a change in cabin pressure, suggesting that the door was left open.

Then, at 8:13pm, the pilots noticed the plane’s tail sustained a sudden, violent upward jerk.

Cooper had jumped.

Two hours later, Flight 305 landed at Reno Airport in Nevada at 10:15pm, with investigators rushing to the aircraft.

The crew’s suspicions were confirmed:

Cooper was not on board.

To this day, despite decades of FBI investigations based on composite drawings and witness testimony, the man identifying himself as Dan Cooper (falsely reported then as DB Cooper) has never been found.

But that's not to say we don't have any evidence.

Nearly ten years later in 1980, an 8-year-old-boy camping in Vancouver, Washington found three packets of 290 $20 bills.

The serial numbers?

Well, they confirmed they were part of the same ransom money given to Cooper in 1971.

Although the remaining 9,710 bills were never found, there has been, however, a fair share of suspects:

First, there's Kenneth Peter Christiansen, who reportedly told his brother on his deathbed in 1994:

"There is something you should know, but I cannot tell you."

He was a paratrooper-turned-Northwest flight attendant, who was a chain-smoking, bourbon-drinking lefty, like Cooper.

Then there's L.D. Cooper, whose niece Marla recalled him planning something "very mischievous" in 1971 nearby Portland.

The day of the hijacking?

He came home in a bloody shirt, claiming he was in a car accident.

He was also obsessed with a comic book hero named...

Dan Cooper

There's also Walter R. Reca, a military vet and member of the Michigan Parachute Team, who told his friend in 2008 he was the hijacker.

But before dying in 2014, he claimed his jump from Flight 305 landed him in Cle Elum, Washington, which was 150 miles north of the flight zone.

Then we have navy vet William J. Smith, whose photo taken here 14 years after the composite was done, is pretty shocking.

Investigators also found aluminum clippings presumably from a train maintenance facility on the hijacker's tie clip.

Where'd Smith work in 1971?

A railroad

Finally, there's Duane L. Weber, who confessed to his wife before dying in 1995:

"I am Dan Cooper."

Weber's wife said years before that Duane had nightmares about leaving fingerprints on the "aft stairs" and told folks his bummed knee was a result of "jumping out of a plane".

Whilst half a century later we STILL don't know who the real Cooper was, one thing's for certain, whether dead or alive:

The legend that is D.B. Cooper...will never die.

Learn something new today?

Follow @DavidZabinsky for more informative threads on the interesting stories, places, and people of our world.

For more on all things D.B. Cooper, just give the name a Google...and make sure you don't have anything important to do for the next three days.