Here's another round of questions. I accept Cooper was inspired by the failed Paul Cini hijacking and was able to engineer his heist in a relatively short period of time (11 days) using information he already had. So, he could easily put on a parachute harness before the Cini hijacking. He had to be familiar with air travel around SeaTac, and might have been a frequent flyer into the area. I also think he might have been a regular Northwest passenger. He would have flown an airline he was most comfortable with, as I believe he would have made many decisions based on personal comfort (which is why I believe he was wearing his typical wardrobe for the flight).
But what kind of piloting experience could he have had? When asked about flap settings, he said fifteen degrees. I'm not a pilot, so I had to look it up, flaps start creating more drag than lift at 10 degrees. Did Cooper guess at "15 degrees" because he knew this fact? Could he have learned the flap settings on a 727 without working at Boeing? Did he revert to knowledge from his own piloting lessons? Are there common contemporary private aircraft with similar flap settings? Same deal with having the landing gear down, he would have to have some knowledge of aeronautics before the Cini hijacking. What is the minimum amount of experience Cooper could have had based on these facts?
