Parachute Of Infamous Hijacker ‘D.B. Cooper’ May Have Been Found
Posted March 26, 2008 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Is it a tantalizing clue to one of the biggest mysteries in modern history or just a coincidence? That’s what the FBI is trying to figure out after an amazing discovery in Washington State.
Kids playing outside their home in a place called Amboy last month were watching their father grading a road, when they saw something sticking up from the ground where the machine had just been. Curious, they pulled on what appeared to be fabric and it just kept coming out.
By the time, it was fully exposed it was clear what it was – a parachute. It was old, faded, and turned slightly brown with age, but it had definitely been deployed and appeared to have been used to jump out of a plane. It was discovered near an area where one of the legendary criminals in North American history is believed to have struck, a man known only as “Dan Cooper”, often incorrectly identified as “D.B. Cooper.”
He’s the hijacker who commandeered a Northwest Orient flight from Portland, Ore., to Seattle in November 1971, claimed he had a bomb and demanded $200,000 in ransom. When the jet landed in Seattle, he released the passengers, kept the crew, was given his money and the plane took off.
Somewhere over the Oregon border, he strapped on a parachute and jumped. What happened next has been shrouded in mystery for 36 years. While some of the money was discovered by a young child in 1980, most of it was never spent and there’s been little trace of it – or Cooper – since.
Some believe he died in the wilderness, while others have long been convinced he’s happily retired in some remote place, forever keeping his secret.
Now this new clue is providing the hope that some answers may finally emerge. “When we went to the public, the whole idea was that the public is going to bring the answers to us,” explains FBI agent Larry Carr. “This is exactly what we were hoping for.”
The Bureau has reason to believe the find is the real thing. It was the same colour as the one Cooper used and was located in the area where investigators always believed he landed.
But Carr’s efforts to find the harness or other remains proved fruitless and the family was unable to tell him the exact spot where the chute had been recovered. He’s hoping experts will be able to pinpoint the type and whether it’s possible Cooper could have used it. A fabric analysis is likely to try and determine the age.
But not everything points to it coming from the criminal. The small amount of money found nearly 30 years ago was discovered a long way away. And while it’s possible it could have been washed ashore where the youngster discovered it, it seems unlikely it would have travelled intact all that distance.
And that adds a new piece to this already bizarre puzzle. “If this is D.B. Cooper’s parachute, the money could not have arrived at its discovery location by natural means,” Carr agrees. “That whole theory is out the window.”
And like the parachute, there’s no way of knowing yet where this probe will land.
