Turns out an AOA indicator provides very useful info for general aviation pilots. My son owns and flies a two seat carbon fiber Aero Shark with two very up to date glass panels. He not only has an a AOA indicator on each LCD panel but also a voice annunciator that will give a loud verbal warning if AOA increases beyond safe limits given other factors such as airspeed. He bought the plane used from an Air National Guard F-16 pilot. The seller gave him a lot of useful tips about AOA, info that was omitted from my son’s basic flight training. My son told me if you stay on top of AOA you will never have an unintended stall.

377

Glass panels came along well after I retired so I don't have any personal experience with them or with AOA instruments either.  But wings do stall at essentially the same angle of attack which depends on the flap/slats configuration among other things.  For a specific configuration, the stall speed varies as a function of the aircraft's weight.  But as your son points out, if you keep the AOA below the stall AOA for your specific aircraft configuration you won't stall.

As I mentioned previously, the Navy pioneered the use of AOA indicators.  I have heard that the Navy tries to keep the wind over the deck at a given value and will adjust the speed of the carrier to maintain that speed.  So presumably the deck touchdown speed of an aircraft will vary depending on the weight of the landing aircraft.  That is, identical configured aircraft flying at the same AOA will touch down at different speeds depending on their weight.

it's interesting that Braden turned to petty crime.

I was wondering what other MACV-SOG turned to crime

in terms of numbers, it's a relatively small number of  people

here's an estimate of total numbers, from a macvsog kia/mia web page
He estimates 400-600 in recon/hatchet teams during the entire vietnam operational period.

And Braden was a team leader!

from  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login
12,000 were Special Forces Soldiers who served in Vietnam , other sources say 20,000. of that 12,000 only 2,000 served in Vietnam with SOG.   ---- And of those 2,000, only 400 to a maximum of 600 served in SOG Recon/Hatchet Forces


Commandos who were the SF troop Operators actually fighting in a combat environment with the other 1,400 being support during the 8 year period of their existence.

Of those 400-600 suffered more than half of all the Special Forces fatalities and eighty-five percent of the SF missing in action cases in the war. This yields 50 to a max of 75 Commando operators per year.

With three (3) operational units, CCN, CCC, CCS, each would have around 17 to 25 SF Commandos operators on an annual basis. (Based on the roster for Command and Control North Recon Company as of April 1971, there were 30 Recon Team with a total of 95 American SF assigned to teams; however, not were operational as some were in stand down or not operational.
During the early years, the teams running were much smaller as the missions grew, the teams requirements grew so it is not possible to know exactly or even approximately how man Americans served in Recon or Hatchet forces over the 1964 thru April 1972.  The first Recon team that ran a mission was inserted October 18, 1965. 

Taking this information, actual operations was, and assuming the last mission was ran the last day April 72, teams were operational for 6 and a half year.  In August 1970 a number of RT member were transferred from CCS to CCN, thus increasing the strength of Recon Company of CCN and reducing the strength for CCS.

I mention this as the 30 team reported in Apr 71 cannot be used as a data point to try and calculate the strength of Recon and Hatchet for each period of time and location.  I, therefore, conclude that the number would be between the calculation of 400 to 600 throughout the entire operational period.

Here's one thing we haven't discussed.
The mythology around the invincible Ted Braden.

Note the mythology extends to WWII. I mean people just like telling stories about how Ted was able to stay alive in risky combat situations.

But look at the petty crimes he got caught for. Seems to me, that he was mediocre when it came to crime. How much other crime did he do that was not discovered? Unknown.

The story of him and wife Pat owning Mercedes is intriguing.
She says she didn't file for divorce because of lack of money.
I'm thinking there was a time when there was money.
Where did it come from? Other petty crime? Trucking insurance fraud?

Braden could be the mixture of competence in one area, and not great competence in another area.

The stories around Braden like to paint him as equally brilliant in everything he did.

He wasn't.

Even the macv-sog stories are a little overstated. None of the missions accomplished as much as they like to say they did.
Sure the guys took risks, And died and took casualties.
But taking risks and dieing...there will always be survivors at some level.
It's hard to say what is attributable to being "good at it"

The best way to stay alive is to not take risks. Or to do things that others think are risky (appearance risk) that really aren't.

Because if the risk is real, you eventually die. Or get caught and sent to federal prison...

Given the small number of macv-sog...
if there was even an inkling of macv-sog suspicion, there couldn't be more than 10 people worth investigating.

I mean I wonder what the list of 10 would be.

Braden was the only thing I came up with.

Georgia, Muscogee County
The following appeared in The Columbus Ledger on January 17th 1950 on page 17:

There will be sold at public outcry to the highest and best bidder for cash before the Court House door of Muscogee County between the legal hours of sale. on the first Tuesday in February, 1950, the following property to-wit:

One 1946 Club Coupe Mercury automobile, Motor No 96A1318394 Said property was found in possession of Hardaway Motor Co. and levied on as the property of Ted B. Braden Jr. to satisfy a foreclosure on conditional bill of sale against him in favor of Federal Services Finance Corporation from the Superior Court of Muscogee County, Ga.

This the 30th day of December, 1949. E. F. Howell, Sheriff, Muscogee Co., Georgia January 16, 17, 24, 31, 1950.

Well, I'm confused.

First, Weather Underground only has weather data from the Portland airport from the night of the hijacking. That data suggests that at 7pm the wind was blowing from the southeast at 5mph and shifted to blowing from the SSW at 12mph by 10pm. This would probably suggest that at the time Cooper bailed the wind was also blowing 5+mph from the SOUTH.

I can't find any weather or wind data between Portland airport and SeaTac. Nothing near where the placard was found. Nothing near Cinebar. Nothing near Ariel.

SeaTac's weather data also has the wind blowing from the south at 7pm but also shifting and blowing from the SOUTHEAST at 14mph.

My point is that I cannot find any substantial weather data for the route south between Seattle and Portland, and what data I did find suggests that the wind was blowing from the south or southeast and didn't shift to the SSW until after Cooper jumped.

That's why I am eager to find more weather data. I'd love to hear some thoughts on this as it has been taken for granted that the wind was blowing from the SSW at the time Cooper jumped.

I've been doing a deep dive into the weather data from that night. I received data from a source that the wind direction - both on the ground and aloft - was likely NOT blowing consistently from the southwest to the northeast. Rather, the winds between LaCenter and Portland were shifting - blowing from the SE to the SW and back again. Thus, they were generally blowing in a north to northwest direction. Clearly, this stands in contrast to the generally accepted idea that the winds were blowing toward the NE. This would have an obvious impact on where Cooper landed and the ensuing ground search. When I have all my ducks in a row, I will be sure to post what I have here for everyone to see.

Tom posted the NOAA data on here. Go look at page 117 of the Flight Path thread. He posted images there. It clearly shows a consistent southerly wind. It does not support your claim that the wind was blowing directly from the southeast to the northeast.

It’s also important to note that this data was collected in Salem, OR and Quillayute Airport in Forks, WA which is a distance of over 200 miles. The DZ would fall somewhere in this large swath of space. The wind speed and direction would be mere extrapolations and not exact representations of the winds aloft near the DZ.

Moreover, in the recent FBI Vault release, there was a segment on weather data provided to the FBI by the US Weather Bureau. This weather data included multiple reporting stations along the West Coast. The data provided was from 7pm, 8pm, and 9pm on the date of the hijacking. The closest reporting stations to any reasonable DZ would be Portland International, Troutdale Airport, and Toledo, WA.

Here is that wind data:

 Time.                         
7pm
Toledo.                160 degrees at 4 knots
PDX.                    130 degrees at 4 knots
Troutdale.            170 degrees at 3 knots

8pm
Toledo.                190 degrees at 5 knots
PDX.                   270 degrees at 10 knots
Troutdale.            220 degrees at 7 knots

9pm
Toledo.                190 degrees at 6 knots
PDX.                   190 degrees at 11 knots
Troutdale.            220 degrees at 1 knot

The outlier of course is PDX at 8pm. According to the data supplied by the US Weather Bureau, the wind shits from out of the SOUTHEAST at 130 degrees to out of the WEST at 270 degrees in one hour and then shifts again from out of the WEST at 270 degrees to out of the SOUTH-SOUTHWEST an hour after that.

Now, that is certainly possible for a dramatic shift in wind over an hour period, but it is unusual. Could it be that the 270 is actually a typographical error and the wind was blowing out of the SOUTH-SOUTHEAST at 170 degrees?

Either way, it would appear that the wind direction was shifting throughout the night, and that any wind speed or direction at the DZ - say between Ariel and the Columbia is merely an estimate based on weather reports from stations miles away.

Even the historical data from Weather Underground states that the wind from from the SE at 8pm at PDX.

I have more information obviously, but I want to make sure I have facts before I make any claims.