The Unsolved Hijacking Of Flight 305

The "D. B. Cooper" case is the only unsolved act of air piracy in US history. On November 24, 1971, a polite, nondescript, and dark-complexioned man calling himself "Dan Cooper" hijacked Northwest Airlines Flight 305, Boeing 727, between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. At Seattle International Airport, he demanded and received $200,000 and four parachutes, released the passengers, and ordered the crew to take him to Mexico. Somewhere along the way, he jumped. He was never found or identified. Forty-five years later, the FBI gave up the hunt. This book looks at the case from the perspective of a mathematician and pilot. It uses previously unexamined data and original-source documents, combined with the tools of statistics, aeronautics, and meteorology, to show where and how the FBI could resume the search and possibly find out at last who "D. B. Cooper" really was.

The UNSOLVED HIJACKING OF FLIGHT 305/ How Justice Was Denied is a work of fiction wrapped around an actual event: the hijacking of Flight 305 between Portland, OR, and Sea-Tac Airport near Seattle, WA, November 24, 1971, by a man who came to be known as D. B. Cooper. This is the only unsolved case of air piracy in United States history. This is the story of a love so strong as to cause the compromise of principles and morals and to overcome the fear of death by jumping from an airplane into the freezing darkness. Our character, Dan Wilson, is backed into a corner when he discovers that Melita, the love of his life, will die without a costly liver transplant. He decides the only way to get a large sum of money fast is to hijack an airliner and demand a $200K ransom. After collecting the ransom money and surviving the jump, he struggles through the wilderness to his means of escape and makes it to Mexico only to lose all the money in a fiery crash. Still in a corner, he makes a deal with the devil. Will Melita, the love of Dannys life, be saved? Can Danny find redemption for his deeds? Will the drug lord, Luis Esperanza, be brought to justice? Who was this Dan Cooper? What really caused him to risk his life for $200K? Did he die in the wilderness, as many in the F.B.I. believe? If he did survive, where did he go? What happened to the bulk of the money? Many questions.few answers. If you like a tale of love and adventure, this book is for you. This is a plausible story and I hope for you, an enjoyable read! Burt H. Slaughter

Put on your detective hat and uncover the facts and myths about the D. B. Cooper hijacking. Topics discussed include the details behind the Flight 305 hijacking, the history of the airline industry and hijackings, air safety and security measures at the time, the hunt for Cooper, confessions from people claiming to be Cooper, and theories about what happened to Cooper and who he was. Features include a Tools and Clues section that highlights research tools, technology, and investigative methods, a timeline, a glossary, selected bibliography, further readings, places to visit, source notes, and an index. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Essential Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

In the chilling haze of a Pacific North West evening, on November 24, 1971, a mysterious man named 'Dan Cooper' boards Northwest Orient Flight 305. Armed with a briefcase bomb and dark shades to mask his intent, he swiftly extorts $200,000 and disappears mid-flight, leaping into the unknown from a Boeing 727's aft staircase. Beneath his enigmatic facade lies a past intertwined with rural Canada, service in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and daring aid-drops in war-torn Vietnam. As the world grapples with his audacious crime, relentless FBI agent Clifford Harding finds himself consumed by the chase. Young, sharp, yet teetering on the edge of obsession, Harding's pursuit blurs the line between justice and vendetta. With shadows from 'Dan's' past looming and Harding's intentions growing murkier, one is left to wonder: Who is the real villain in this airborne dance of deceit? Will Harding unravel the mystery, or become its next casualty?

*Includes pictures. *Provides a detailed account of the hijacking, theories over what happened to Cooper, and a discussion of some of the main suspects. *Includes quotes by important participants in the case. *Includes a bibliography for further reading. "Maybe a hydrologist can use the latest technology to trace the $5,800 in ransom money found in 1980 to where Cooper landed upstream. Or maybe someone just remembers that odd uncle." - FBI Special Agent Larry Carr On November 24, 1971, there was little to suggest that the skies above the Pacific Northwest would produce one of the greatest mysteries in American history and a criminal investigation that is still ongoing over 40 years later. However, on the day before Thanksgiving, a man calling himself Dan Cooper boarded Northwest Orient Flight 305 from Portland to Seattle and sat in the rear of the cabin. Shortly after takeoff, the man handed a flight attendant warning that he had a bomb and informed her that he was hijacking the plane. Cooper demanded $200,000, several parachutes, and a truck to refuel the plane when it landed in Seattle. Another flight attendant would later inform authorities, "He seemed rather nice. He was never cruel or nasty. He was thoughtful and calm all the time." When the plane landed at Seattle-Tacoma Airport, Cooper's demands were met, after which he let all of the passengers and most of the crew off. He then told pilot William Scott to fly towards Mexico at no higher than 10,000 feet and at the slowest possible speed, which would also require a refueling stop in Reno, Nevada. About 30 minutes after the plane had taken off, Cooper manually activated the aft air staircase near the back of the cabin and apparently jumped out of the plane shortly after. The plane landed without any problems at Reno about 90 minutes after Cooper had activated the staircase to exit. Despite leaving dozens of fingerprints, as well as a couple of personal effects, authorities could not identify Cooper, even though Cooper was being actively investigated within minutes of hijacking the plane on its way to Seattle. Furthermore, nobody was sure where Cooper landed, or if he even survived the jump, and few clues were found even after one of the most intensive manhunts in American history. Adding to the mystery is the fact that Cooper couldn't possibly have known his precise location when he jumped due to the cloud cover at 5,000 feet obscuring visibility. Since that night in November 1971, only a little light has been shed on the mystery. In 1980, a boy playing along the banks of the Columbia River found some of the stolen money still banded together but in bad shape. This heightened the belief of many that Cooper didn't land safely, and that he may have fallen into a body of water, but the inability to locate other money and the fact that some bills were missing from the discovered packets alternatively suggest that Cooper survived the jump and intentionally buried the money. Either way, the additional findings have only added to the intrigue and speculation over who Cooper was, and the mystery and fascination with the case has only made things more difficult, as it produced apparent copycat attempts and a host of individuals who claimed to be D.B. Cooper on their deathbeds, forcing investigators to check out and refute claims. To date, those in charge of the investigation have enough evidence to eliminate the names traditionally listed as suspects, either through fingerprints or alibis. As a result, the identity of D.B. Cooper and his fate remain unsolved, and over 40 years after he jumped out of that plane, the FBI doesn't know much too more than it did in 1971. History's Greatest Mysteries: The Unsolved Case of D.B. Cooper comprehensively covers the facts, mysteries, and theories surrounding the only unsolved hijacking case in America.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The true, unsolved story of D. B. Cooper’s 1971 airplane hijacking, one of the greatest cold cases of the twentieth century, by an author featured in D.B. Cooper: Where Are You?!, now streaming on Netflix “Here is writing and storytelling that is vivid and fresh—a delectable adventure.”—Gay Talese “I have a bomb here and I would like you to sit by me.” That was the note handed to flight attendant Florence Schaffner by a mild-mannered passenger now known as D. B. Cooper on a Northwest Orient flight in 1971. It was also the start of one of the most astonishing aviation whodunits in the history of American true crime: how one man extorted $200,000 from an airline before parachuting into the wilds of the Pacific Northwest, never to be seen again. The case of D. B. Cooper is a modern legend that has obsessed and cursed his pursuers for generations with everything from bankruptcy to suicidal despair. Now, with Skyjack, Geoffrey Gray obtains a first-ever look at the FBI’s confidential Cooper file, uncovering new leads in the infamous case. Starting with a crack tip from a private investigator, Gray plunges into the murky depths of the decades-old mystery to chase down new clues and explore secrets of the case’s most prominent suspects, including Ralph Himmelsbach, the most dogged of FBI agents, who watched with horror as a criminal became a counter-culture folk hero; Karl Fleming, a respected reporter whose career was destroyed by a D. B. Cooper scoop that was a scam; and Barbara Dayton, a transgender pilot who insisted she was Cooper herself. With explosive new information, Skyjack reopens one of the great cold cases of the twentieth century.

He jumped out of a Boeing 727 into the November chill of the Pacific Northwest in 1971. He was carrying $200,000 and a briefcase he said contained a bomb. No trace of the man known as D.B. Cooper has ever been found. Who was he? Where is he? Will the D. B.Cooper mystery ever be solved?

November 24, 1971 - A man known to the F.B.I. as 'Dan Cooper' leaped from the aft stairway of a Boeing 727 after demanding four parachutes and $200,000 in cash. He was never seen again, and nearly forty years later, he has never been identified - until now. During the initial investigation, few in law enforcement suspected that the hijacker could actually be an employee of the airline, and that was their mistake. Kenneth Peter Christiansen, a former World War II paratrooper and later a purser for Northwest Airlines, was the man who pulled off the boldest unsolved crime in history. Skipp Porteous of Sherlock Investigations, New York, and Robert Blevins of Adventure Books of Seattle present the case that Christiansen and Cooper were one and the same. Into The Blast shows how Kenny Christiansen planned the hijacking of NWA Flight 305, what motivated him to do it, who helped him on the ground, and what he did with the money afterward. More than thirty pictures, as well as interviews with the witnesses, reveals the truth at last in this fascinating book.