As far as pressure issues go...  R99 can help me with this if I'm wrong, but if I remember correctly, I think airliners are pressurized to the equivalent of 8K MSL. So the difference between 8 and 10 wouldn't be that much. And I'm not sure at what altitude they start pressurizing, but I know the FAA requirements for oxygen don't start until 14K. Also, although that rear bulkhead (and not the stairs) is the pressure hull, I think it could be assumed that if Cooper was going to be accessing the stairs, that the bulkhead door would be open.

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I'm generalizing here.  The air stairs deal seems to fall into two camps here.  One is a group that thinks Cooper knew a lot about the stairs, particularly from secret info (CIA, Vietnam, Boeing etc).  The other group thinks he only knew a little bit.

I'm in the group that thinks he knew some, but not a lot.  One theory is that he could have simply flown on a 727 before and saw the flight attendants operate the stairs before taking off, then made an assumption that the stairs could be used in flight.  He seemed like he knew what he was doing at first, but then not so much.  Kind of like a guy seeing a home improvement video and thinking he can remodel his house.  It's harder than it looks.  He may have even talked to pilots or ground crew, we just don't know.  There are 302s that have suspects at Elsinore asking about jumping, and one on a passenger plane in California (Burbank) claiming to be doing movie research.

I could argue both sides of this.  Cooper did ask for the plane to fly low and slow, so that could indicate that he knew the stairs would be more likely to deploy if the plane was depressurized.  If he was an aircrew member in the military, he may have seen planes fly with ladders down, doors open, with guys hanging out, etc.

The other side of me says that if he had never seen the 727 do this, then he was taking a huge risk that the stairs could cause air flow issues, or even make the plane unflyable.  Or if they took off with the stairs down, do too much damage to the plane.  Very risky on his part.

I hope we find out someday.

If he flew a 727 before and watched the attendants operate the stairs then why did he ask that Tina show him how to lower the aft stairs? Cooper seemed to calculated up until that point to make an assumption with the stairs... if guesses wrong well that’s a wrap. Hell Cooper even argued that the plane could take off with the stairs down and was right. I don’t even think familiarity with the SAT combi 727 covert missions for the cia would of told you that. Cooper knew the fueling times for the 727 and according to Loren Peterson who was a freight mechanic working for nwa on duty the night of the cooper hijacking cooper actually gave instructions to balance the fuel tanks a certain way because they were flying in this low and slow configuration as you mentioned. You say cooper knew what he was doing at first but then not so much. What about his actions later in the skyjacking suggest to you this was the case. I have a hard time buying cooper was smart at first but then all of a sudden became dumb.

Nicky, it is more like he played smart then did not seem as smart.  I subscribe to Larry Carr's profile that he was a know it all type, maybe thought he was smarter than everyone else.  Everything went his way for the most part until he had to mess with the stairs.  Granted the fueling took a while, but even with that he acted like he knew about fueling.  I don't see how he had to know about the 727 in particular, just aircraft fueling.  Once he starts with the stairs, then things seem to go a little off plan.  Do you think things went smoothly for him when he tried to operate the stairs?

Like I said, one group thinks he knew a lot about the 727 (you're in that group), another group thinks he knew just enough to be dangerous, so to say.  That's me.

On another note, someone mentioned it once, that at a certain altitude when de-pressurized, that oxygen masks would come out automatically.  Not sure if that was true in 1971, but that could have been an issue too. 

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I'm generalizing here.  The air stairs deal seems to fall into two camps here.  One is a group that thinks Cooper knew a lot about the stairs, particularly from secret info (CIA, Vietnam, Boeing etc).  The other group thinks he only knew a little bit.

I'm in the group that thinks he knew some, but not a lot.  One theory is that he could have simply flown on a 727 before and saw the flight attendants operate the stairs before taking off, then made an assumption that the stairs could be used in flight.  He seemed like he knew what he was doing at first, but then not so much.  Kind of like a guy seeing a home improvement video and thinking he can remodel his house.  It's harder than it looks.  He may have even talked to pilots or ground crew, we just don't know.  There are 302s that have suspects at Elsinore asking about jumping, and one on a passenger plane in California (Burbank) claiming to be doing movie research.

I could argue both sides of this.  Cooper did ask for the plane to fly low and slow, so that could indicate that he knew the stairs would be more likely to deploy if the plane was depressurized.  If he was an aircrew member in the military, he may have seen planes fly with ladders down, doors open, with guys hanging out, etc.

The other side of me says that if he had never seen the 727 do this, then he was taking a huge risk that the stairs could cause air flow issues, or even make the plane unflyable.  Or if they took off with the stairs down, do too much damage to the plane.  Very risky on his part.

I hope we find out someday.

If he flew a 727 before and watched the attendants operate the stairs then why did he ask that Tina show him how to lower the aft stairs? Cooper seemed to calculated up until that point to make an assumption with the stairs... if guesses wrong well that’s a wrap. Hell Cooper even argued that the plane could take off with the stairs down and was right. I don’t even think familiarity with the SAT combi 727 covert missions for the cia would of told you that. Cooper knew the fueling times for the 727 and according to Loren Peterson who was a freight mechanic working for nwa on duty the night of the cooper hijacking cooper actually gave instructions to balance the fuel tanks a certain way because they were flying in this low and slow configuration as you mentioned. You say cooper knew what he was doing at first but then not so much. What about his actions later in the skyjacking suggest to you this was the case. I have a hard time buying cooper was smart at first but then all of a sudden became dumb.

Peterson's statement is contradicted by the fact that Cooper wanted a full fuel load (all tanks filled) and came close to having that when he told the cockpit crew to stop the refueling and take off.

Is this in the 302's? How do we know this for certain? Another thing judging by cooper getting very antsy with the delayed refueling he wasn't keen on spending very much time on the ground. That's also supported by his statement "lets get this show on the road." So did cooper just happen to get lucky that there happened to be 250k bundled up ready for delivery nearby? This was thanksgiving eve it would of took a while if the feds had to scramble to different banks to scrounge up the 200k, that would of further delayed coopers opp. Same thing with the chutes...how convenient was it to have issaquah sky sports with civilian chutes on hand in close proximity. I think cooper knew all the factors at play and that played into why he was so cool and calm. There was no uncertainty in coopers mind,

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I'm generalizing here.  The air stairs deal seems to fall into two camps here.  One is a group that thinks Cooper knew a lot about the stairs, particularly from secret info (CIA, Vietnam, Boeing etc).  The other group thinks he only knew a little bit.

I'm in the group that thinks he knew some, but not a lot.  One theory is that he could have simply flown on a 727 before and saw the flight attendants operate the stairs before taking off, then made an assumption that the stairs could be used in flight.  He seemed like he knew what he was doing at first, but then not so much.  Kind of like a guy seeing a home improvement video and thinking he can remodel his house.  It's harder than it looks.  He may have even talked to pilots or ground crew, we just don't know.  There are 302s that have suspects at Elsinore asking about jumping, and one on a passenger plane in California (Burbank) claiming to be doing movie research.

I could argue both sides of this.  Cooper did ask for the plane to fly low and slow, so that could indicate that he knew the stairs would be more likely to deploy if the plane was depressurized.  If he was an aircrew member in the military, he may have seen planes fly with ladders down, doors open, with guys hanging out, etc.

The other side of me says that if he had never seen the 727 do this, then he was taking a huge risk that the stairs could cause air flow issues, or even make the plane unflyable.  Or if they took off with the stairs down, do too much damage to the plane.  Very risky on his part.

I hope we find out someday.

If he flew a 727 before and watched the attendants operate the stairs then why did he ask that Tina show him how to lower the aft stairs? Cooper seemed to calculated up until that point to make an assumption with the stairs... if guesses wrong well that’s a wrap. Hell Cooper even argued that the plane could take off with the stairs down and was right. I don’t even think familiarity with the SAT combi 727 covert missions for the cia would of told you that. Cooper knew the fueling times for the 727 and according to Loren Peterson who was a freight mechanic working for nwa on duty the night of the cooper hijacking cooper actually gave instructions to balance the fuel tanks a certain way because they were flying in this low and slow configuration as you mentioned. You say cooper knew what he was doing at first but then not so much. What about his actions later in the skyjacking suggest to you this was the case. I have a hard time buying cooper was smart at first but then all of a sudden became dumb.

Peterson's statement is contradicted by the fact that Cooper wanted a full fuel load (all tanks filled) and came close to having that when he told the cockpit crew to stop the refueling and take off.

Is this in the 302's? How do we know this for certain? Another thing judging by cooper getting very antsy with the delayed refueling he wasn't keen on spending very much time on the ground. That's also supported by his statement "lets get this show on the road." So did cooper just happen to get lucky that there happened to be 250k bundled up ready for delivery nearby? This was thanksgiving eve it would of took a while if the feds had to scramble to different banks to scrounge up the 200k, that would of further delayed coopers opp. Same thing with the chutes...how convenient was it to have issaquah sky sports with civilian chutes on hand in close proximity. I think cooper knew all the factors at play and that played into why he was so cool and calm. There was no uncertainty in coopers mind,

Cooper was very lucky that the NWA president told the flight crew, the FBI, and other NWA personnel to cooperate with him.  There are some indications that Cooper was not familiar with USA banking hours.  The fact that the FBI and a bank had made some plans for just such an event is a plus in the way they handled the matter.

The airliner landed at SEATAC at approximately 5:30PM (about 45 minutes or so after sunset on a cloudy and rainy night) and took off at 7:36PM.  That means it was on the ground for 2:00+ hours.  Since it parked in a remote area meant that it had to be refueled from trucks which were probably no longer being used regularly for refueling.  Hence, vapor locks and other mishaps.  If it had parked at a normal gate, it probably could have been refueled from underground facilities in no more than 15 minutes with no problems.

In my opinion, Cooper was very lucky until he stepped off the aft stairs and came face to face with Mother Nature.  Mother Nature is very impartial and not very likely to go along with other people's plans and I suspect that Cooper got educated the hard way in two minutes or less.  And that is why what happened to him is still a mystery. 

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I'm generalizing here.  The air stairs deal seems to fall into two camps here.  One is a group that thinks Cooper knew a lot about the stairs, particularly from secret info (CIA, Vietnam, Boeing etc).  The other group thinks he only knew a little bit.

I'm in the group that thinks he knew some, but not a lot.  One theory is that he could have simply flown on a 727 before and saw the flight attendants operate the stairs before taking off, then made an assumption that the stairs could be used in flight.  He seemed like he knew what he was doing at first, but then not so much.  Kind of like a guy seeing a home improvement video and thinking he can remodel his house.  It's harder than it looks.  He may have even talked to pilots or ground crew, we just don't know.  There are 302s that have suspects at Elsinore asking about jumping, and one on a passenger plane in California (Burbank) claiming to be doing movie research.

I could argue both sides of this.  Cooper did ask for the plane to fly low and slow, so that could indicate that he knew the stairs would be more likely to deploy if the plane was depressurized.  If he was an aircrew member in the military, he may have seen planes fly with ladders down, doors open, with guys hanging out, etc.

The other side of me says that if he had never seen the 727 do this, then he was taking a huge risk that the stairs could cause air flow issues, or even make the plane unflyable.  Or if they took off with the stairs down, do too much damage to the plane.  Very risky on his part.

I hope we find out someday.

If he flew a 727 before and watched the attendants operate the stairs then why did he ask that Tina show him how to lower the aft stairs? Cooper seemed to calculated up until that point to make an assumption with the stairs... if guesses wrong well that’s a wrap. Hell Cooper even argued that the plane could take off with the stairs down and was right. I don’t even think familiarity with the SAT combi 727 covert missions for the cia would of told you that. Cooper knew the fueling times for the 727 and according to Loren Peterson who was a freight mechanic working for nwa on duty the night of the cooper hijacking cooper actually gave instructions to balance the fuel tanks a certain way because they were flying in this low and slow configuration as you mentioned. You say cooper knew what he was doing at first but then not so much. What about his actions later in the skyjacking suggest to you this was the case. I have a hard time buying cooper was smart at first but then all of a sudden became dumb.

Peterson's statement is contradicted by the fact that Cooper wanted a full fuel load (all tanks filled) and came close to having that when he told the cockpit crew to stop the refueling and take off.

Is this in the 302's? How do we know this for certain? Another thing judging by cooper getting very antsy with the delayed refueling he wasn't keen on spending very much time on the ground. That's also supported by his statement "lets get this show on the road." So did cooper just happen to get lucky that there happened to be 250k bundled up ready for delivery nearby? This was thanksgiving eve it would of took a while if the feds had to scramble to different banks to scrounge up the 200k, that would of further delayed coopers opp. Same thing with the chutes...how convenient was it to have issaquah sky sports with civilian chutes on hand in close proximity. I think cooper knew all the factors at play and that played into why he was so cool and calm. There was no uncertainty in coopers mind,

Cooper was very lucky that the NWA president told the flight crew, the FBI, and other NWA personnel to cooperate with him.  There are some indications that Cooper was not familiar with USA banking hours.  The fact that the FBI and a bank had made some plans for just such an event is a plus in the way they handled the matter.

The airliner landed at SEATAC at approximately 5:30PM (about 45 minutes or so after sunset on a cloudy and rainy night) and took off at 7:36PM.  That means it was on the ground for 2:00+ hours.  Since it parked in a remote area meant that it had to be refueled from trucks which were probably no longer being used regularly for refueling.  Hence, vapor locks and other mishaps.  If it had parked at a normal gate, it probably could have been refueled from underground facilities in no more than 15 minutes with no problems.

In my opinion, Cooper was very lucky until he stepped off the aft stairs and came face to face with Mother Nature.  Mother Nature is very impartial and not very likely to go along with other people's plans and I suspect that Cooper got educated the hard way in two minutes or less.  And that is why what happened to him is still a mystery.

Yepper. Cooper was very lucky. Lucky he didn;t confuse Seattle with Sigourney, Iowa or Bangkok, Lithuania !      What luck! 

If there was a vaccine to cure stupidity, Georger would probably refuse to take it.

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I'm generalizing here.  The air stairs deal seems to fall into two camps here.  One is a group that thinks Cooper knew a lot about the stairs, particularly from secret info (CIA, Vietnam, Boeing etc).  The other group thinks he only knew a little bit.

I'm in the group that thinks he knew some, but not a lot.  One theory is that he could have simply flown on a 727 before and saw the flight attendants operate the stairs before taking off, then made an assumption that the stairs could be used in flight.  He seemed like he knew what he was doing at first, but then not so much.  Kind of like a guy seeing a home improvement video and thinking he can remodel his house.  It's harder than it looks.  He may have even talked to pilots or ground crew, we just don't know.  There are 302s that have suspects at Elsinore asking about jumping, and one on a passenger plane in California (Burbank) claiming to be doing movie research.

I could argue both sides of this.  Cooper did ask for the plane to fly low and slow, so that could indicate that he knew the stairs would be more likely to deploy if the plane was depressurized.  If he was an aircrew member in the military, he may have seen planes fly with ladders down, doors open, with guys hanging out, etc.

The other side of me says that if he had never seen the 727 do this, then he was taking a huge risk that the stairs could cause air flow issues, or even make the plane unflyable.  Or if they took off with the stairs down, do too much damage to the plane.  Very risky on his part.

I hope we find out someday.

If he flew a 727 before and watched the attendants operate the stairs then why did he ask that Tina show him how to lower the aft stairs? Cooper seemed to calculated up until that point to make an assumption with the stairs... if guesses wrong well that’s a wrap. Hell Cooper even argued that the plane could take off with the stairs down and was right. I don’t even think familiarity with the SAT combi 727 covert missions for the cia would of told you that. Cooper knew the fueling times for the 727 and according to Loren Peterson who was a freight mechanic working for nwa on duty the night of the cooper hijacking cooper actually gave instructions to balance the fuel tanks a certain way because they were flying in this low and slow configuration as you mentioned. You say cooper knew what he was doing at first but then not so much. What about his actions later in the skyjacking suggest to you this was the case. I have a hard time buying cooper was smart at first but then all of a sudden became dumb.

Peterson's statement is contradicted by the fact that Cooper wanted a full fuel load (all tanks filled) and came close to having that when he told the cockpit crew to stop the refueling and take off.

Is this in the 302's? How do we know this for certain? Another thing judging by cooper getting very antsy with the delayed refueling he wasn't keen on spending very much time on the ground. That's also supported by his statement "lets get this show on the road." So did cooper just happen to get lucky that there happened to be 250k bundled up ready for delivery nearby? This was thanksgiving eve it would of took a while if the feds had to scramble to different banks to scrounge up the 200k, that would of further delayed coopers opp. Same thing with the chutes...how convenient was it to have issaquah sky sports with civilian chutes on hand in close proximity. I think cooper knew all the factors at play and that played into why he was so cool and calm. There was no uncertainty in coopers mind,

Cooper was very lucky that the NWA president told the flight crew, the FBI, and other NWA personnel to cooperate with him.  There are some indications that Cooper was not familiar with USA banking hours.  The fact that the FBI and a bank had made some plans for just such an event is a plus in the way they handled the matter.

The airliner landed at SEATAC at approximately 5:30PM (about 45 minutes or so after sunset on a cloudy and rainy night) and took off at 7:36PM.  That means it was on the ground for 2:00+ hours.  Since it parked in a remote area meant that it had to be refueled from trucks which were probably no longer being used regularly for refueling.  Hence, vapor locks and other mishaps.  If it had parked at a normal gate, it probably could have been refueled from underground facilities in no more than 15 minutes with no problems.

In my opinion, Cooper was very lucky until he stepped off the aft stairs and came face to face with Mother Nature.  Mother Nature is very impartial and not very likely to go along with other people's plans and I suspect that Cooper got educated the hard way in two minutes or less.  And that is why what happened to him is still a mystery.

Yepper. Cooper was very lucky. Lucky he didn;t confuse Seattle with Sigourney, Iowa or Bangkok, Lithuania !      What luck! 

If there was a vaccine to cure stupidity, Georger would probably refuse to take it.

There is no vaccine to cure stupifdity. 

In my research into the tie particles, I found myself perplexed by one of the particles:  "tin copper bromine".

I reached out to a chemist and he gave me this answer about what it is and what it might be used for:

"May be a bronze particle that has reacted with a bromine salt. Some contamination from a metal tubing or even as strange as a door knob perhaps. A really strange guess is a corrosion-resistant metal alloy use in water treatment where bromine is the biocide. A large swimming pool or industrial water treatment facility."

That last part struck me because several of the particles are connected to water treatment. Pure titanium is used in desalination tanks. Zirconium is used in desalination tank pumps. Phosphorus is used as a water softener. Lead phospate particles appear when phosphate-contaminated water travels through lead pipes. Cadmium is used in the production of PVC pipes. Obviously, chlorine is a well-known chemical used in water treatment.

Let's not forget that several of the metals on the tie are corrosion-resistant. Also, bromine is used in brazing and welding which aligns with what NickyB has been looking into.

May not be anything to it, but it's an interesting coincidence nonetheless.

Plumber or employee in a plumbing supply company ? Maybe a city employee ?

In my research into the tie particles, I found myself perplexed by one of the particles:  "tin copper bromine".

I reached out to a chemist and he gave me this answer about what it is and what it might be used for:

"May be a bronze particle that has reacted with a bromine salt. Some contamination from a metal tubing or even as strange as a door knob perhaps. A really strange guess is a corrosion-resistant metal alloy use in water treatment where bromine is the biocide. A large swimming pool or industrial water treatment facility."

That last part struck me because several of the particles are connected to water treatment. Pure titanium is used in desalination tanks. Zirconium is used in desalination tank pumps. Phosphorus is used as a water softener. Lead phospate particles appear when phosphate-contaminated water travels through lead pipes. Cadmium is used in the production of PVC pipes. Obviously, chlorine is a well-known chemical used in water treatment.

Let's not forget that several of the metals on the tie are corrosion-resistant. Also, bromine is used in brazing and welding which aligns with what NickyB has been looking into.

May not be anything to it, but it's an interesting coincidence nonetheless.

Interesting Chaucer on the water treatment.  I have some loose theories, and some theories that I would consider quite a bit more tightened up.  One of my loose theories has titanium in water de-salinization at a plant in New Jersey, and a loose connection to a comment in Max Gunther's book that could be tied to something to do with water transfer.

Regardless of if there is a connection to water purification, I still believe that the particles on the tie could come from many places, not just the few that we have all been focusing on (Boeing, Tektronix, RMI, etc.).  I've stated before that titanium was not as rare as has been described.  Even if it was just focused on the aircraft industry, that opens us up to Grumman, Northrop, Pratt Whitney, General Dynamics, McDonnel Douglas, etc.  I found a report that references many of the well known fighters from the Vietnam era and titanium.  The pushback will be "Well that was not commercially pure titanium"  Wouldn't a company that was skilled with titanium production have ways to produce many versions?  Are we positive that there were no small commercially pure titanium parts on some of these high tech fighters and bombers?  I think analysis of these particles is a great place for some deep research.