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I'd be more than happy to believe Cooper back-engineered the jump without a priori knowledge of the 727, (in fact, I would find that preferable) but I'd need evidence. Where could a laymen get information about the 727 stairs not having locking mechanisms when stairs on other aircraft had them? Where could a laymen get knowledge about the flight configuration (gears down, flaps at 15, unpressurized cabin)? Where could a laymen without jump experience learn the basics of parachuting (checking packing cards, easily strapping into a harness) without going to a skydiving school and asking a bunch of suspicious questions? [I would think any Cooper suspect who walked into a skydiving school, asked a bunch of questions, then disappeared, would have been reported to the FBI after the jump].

Cooper seems to have extensive knowledge about flaps, airspeed, etc., but doesn't know how what he asks for affects fuel consumption and the range of the aircraft?  He seems informed in some areas and ignorant in others.  Just like his knowledge of the airstairs. He seems to know they can be deployed during flight, yet doesn't seem to know how to open them.  Could it be that much of his knowledge came from study, not experience?

Not likely to be from study since the program to demonstrate jumping and dropping things from the aft stairs of the 727 was done for a CIA front organization.  And CIA organizations do not generally like to have their activities publicized.  On the evening of the hijacking, it took NWA some time to locate any people at Boeing who had knowledge of lowering the stairs in flight.  That program was simply not common knowledge either at Boeing or any commercial airline.

On Cooper having difficulty lowering the stairs, even after Tina had told him how to do it, the controls for the stairs may have been different than any he had seen before, even assuming he had seen some such controls previously.

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I'd be more than happy to believe Cooper back-engineered the jump without a priori knowledge of the 727, (in fact, I would find that preferable) but I'd need evidence. Where could a laymen get information about the 727 stairs not having locking mechanisms when stairs on other aircraft had them? Where could a laymen get knowledge about the flight configuration (gears down, flaps at 15, unpressurized cabin)? Where could a laymen without jump experience learn the basics of parachuting (checking packing cards, easily strapping into a harness) without going to a skydiving school and asking a bunch of suspicious questions? [I would think any Cooper suspect who walked into a skydiving school, asked a bunch of questions, then disappeared, would have been reported to the FBI after the jump].

Cooper seems to have extensive knowledge about flaps, airspeed, etc., but doesn't know how what he asks for affects fuel consumption and the range of the aircraft?  He seems informed in some areas and ignorant in others.  Just like his knowledge of the airstairs. He seems to know they can be deployed during flight, yet doesn't seem to know how to open them.  Could it be that much of his knowledge came from study, not experience?

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Could it be that much of his knowledge came from study, not experience?

That's how I have looked at it. also, he never bothered, or cared how the plane got to Mexico, no flight updates, altitudes, direction, nothing. this could point to wanting out of the plane quickly, or not enough knowledge such as McCoy had who was extremely accurate with his landing. his background was known, and extensive. we can only speculate on Cooper....

Shutter is correct that Cooper apparently wanted to jump soon after take off.  After jumping, the airliner was not something that he cared about.  Whatever happened to the airliner was their tough luck.

I appreciate people don't wish to cover old ground, but what do you base your feelings on?

wanted to jump soon after take off      ..... and .... whatever happened to the airliner was their tough luck.

Do you believe Cooper knew what route they would be taking and if so how? According to Larry, Cooper had no idea what route they were taking except for heading south to Reno (on just enough fuel to make it) ?

Do you believe Cooper knew what route they would be taking and if so how? According to Larry, Cooper had no idea what route they were taking except for heading south to Reno (on just enough fuel to make it) ?

Cooper chose Mexico City and not say New York. He agreed upon Reno because it wasn't an issue. I don't think even the flight plan was an issue but what was, is that it was in the "direction" from Seattle to Mexico. Cooper's demands for the stairs, etc would suggest he wanted to bail early or quickly if need be (maybe rushed.) It would be to his benefit that the plane stay in the sky for the longest amount of time making it hard to locate him, allowing more time to get out of the area and for evidence from the crew/aircraft itself to be gathered. NWO knew that too as they wanted the plane to land as soon as the crew became aware he bailed.
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Good points above. Time ^ distance equals confusion.

They claim they did not know if he was gone until Reno. They were even late reporting the pressure spike (discussed it for some time before reporting it, then Rataczak called it in according to Anderson).

Rataczak is on record as wanting to fly out into the ocean and let Cooper jump there. They took V23 instead. I guess we have no flight comms that speak to that decision. Did Cooper know where he was and if so how - the question has been asked before without any final answer because for one we don't have Cooper to ask, and no document addresses the issue so far as I know ...
 

According to the transcripts the jump time was recorded, or at least they thought so. they should have looked in the back like most of the other hijackings. If they thought he jumped in the 8:12 position, why didn't they land at PDX as instructed? where is it quoted they were instructed to land if he bailed?

At 7:45pm MSP Flight Ops transmitted that somone will have to take a look back and see if he's still there.
At 7:54pm MSP transmits "As soon as reasonably sure th e man has left the quicker u can land"

They're also consistantly giving 305 airport options at this stage. Cooper knows he's going. The crew know he's going too. They've seen him with the cord around his waist. They know the time is soon. NWO is genuine about the saftey of the crew and craft and they could be influenced by the psych who predicted he was going to jump then blowup the aircraft. For all they knew, Cooper could very well have left the bomb.

also a bit of afterthought but I believe MSP thinks that the aircraft can't make RENo in that config, however no Cooper, gear up, flaps in, and seeing it is the valid destination FBI etc has probably been set up there. It makes sense to continue there.

As usual we have two possibilities. since he had trouble with the stairs it could of caused the delay in his plan. since he had no real idea where he was due to cloud coverage I doubt he intended to jump where they believe he did on purpose. it's all speculation whether he could of seen the lights at the dam, or anywhere else guiding his path.

McCoy was very precise in asking the crew questions about altitude, speed, direction, and weather. Cooper did nothing of the sort. I'm not convinced he was aware where exactly where he was when he bailed.

Is it just a coincidence that if the Cooper suspect landed in the Columbia, that location would be roughly 4 to 8 miles from PDX, the place where he boarded the jet?  That's pretty close.  Maybe 2 minutes away by jet.   Maybe he had a reason to get back to the PDX area?

The Cooper suspect didn't seem to have a plan once he got in the air.  Was he suicidal?  I think I saw a video once where Jerry Thomas said he thought Cooper was actually surprised to get as far as he did and jumped just to get out of the plane, or something to that effect.  Maybe he was trying to get close to PDX because he had ride waiting or something? 

 

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According to the transcripts the jump time was recorded, or at least they thought so. they should have looked in the back like most of the other hijackings. If they thought he jumped in the 8:12 position, why didn't they land at PDX as instructed? where is it quoted they were instructed to land if he bailed?

At 7:45pm MSP Flight Ops transmitted that somone will have to take a look back and see if he's still there.
At 7:54pm MSP transmits "As soon as reasonably sure th e man has left the quicker u can land"

They're also consistantly giving 305 airport options at this stage. Cooper knows he's going. The crew know he's going too. They've seen him with the cord around his waist. They know the time is soon. NWO is genuine about the saftey of the crew and craft and they could be influenced by the psych who predicted he was going to jump then blowup the aircraft. For all they knew, Cooper could very well have left the bomb.

also a bit of afterthought but I believe MSP thinks that the aircraft can't make RENo in that config, however no Cooper, gear up, flaps in, and seeing it is the valid destination FBI etc has probably been set up there. It makes sense to continue there.

NWA didn't have any aircraft performance information for 727s flying in the configuration that Cooper demanded.  That is why the NWA aircraft performance engineers were continually asking for updates on the aircraft's indicated airspeed, altitude, outside air temperature, and the engine fuel flow rates.

And no one was certain that the airliner could even make it to Reno until it was in the Portland area and the NWA performance engineers had enough information to predict that it could get there.  In the meantime, the Air Traffic Control people were giving the airliner alternate airports that could handle it if it could not get to Reno.

In the short period of time I've dived into the Cooper case, I quickly realize that if you don't respect the person, you should question their opinions related to their "facts." It's both a simple and efficient filtering procedure. I've read your posts about the flight path of the aircraft. It's technically proficient. If anything, you should be the go to guy for anything related to it.
so that said wouldn't it be easy for the flight engineers to look at the drag, fuel, with the normal op performance of the 727 and do some simple math. The birds on the ground, they've yet to get a destination/demand. Once they get the destination, it would seem in everyone's best to scramble with the demands (esp aft stair down) on the most simplest, will it get there? MSP knows that flaps 15, gear down, aft stairs UP that they can't make Mexico. They're guessing (max) SFO, maybe PHX. On the ground, prior to take off theyre working on range, correct?

N467US, the NWA aircraft that was hijacked, was a Boeing 727-051 and it was delivered new to NWA in April 1965.  As such, it was a very early 727 and had a relatively short range, which I think was less than 2000 nautical miles under optimal conditions.  And the 10000 feet altitude, low airspeed, landing gear down, and flap considerations (I don't know if the wing leading edge Krueger flaps and moveable slats were deployed at the 15 degree setting), were something that was not optimal and NWA may not have had pertinent information on.

But I am sure that the NWA performance engineers were working on the range problem with the crew and everyone else once Cooper specified the aircraft configuration.  But basically, in the 45 minutes or so it took the airliner to fly from Seattle through the Portland area, the engineers were able to get the information from the crew about the fuel use under the actual flight conditions and they estimated the aircraft could make it to Reno and it did.

Here is a story along the same line.  In the mid-1960s, Boeing got a contract with NASA-Langley to do some flight tests on blown flaps.  The original 707 prototype (N70700) was the aircraft to be used and it was modified at Boeing Seattle for the program.  The modifications included running some ducts, for the air to blow the flaps, through the landing gear retraction areas.  Consequently, the landing gear could not be retracted.  The aircraft was flown from Seattle to the NASA facility at Langley AFB, VA (and eventually back to Seattle) with the landing gear locked down.  I understand it took two days for the trip across the country and I don't know how many stops for refueling.  I saw the aircraft flying a number of times in the Langley area and it was always with all four engines screaming bloody murder and the aircraft doing about 150 Knots.   

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According to the transcripts the jump time was recorded, or at least they thought so. they should have looked in the back like most of the other hijackings. If they thought he jumped in the 8:12 position, why didn't they land at PDX as instructed? where is it quoted they were instructed to land if he bailed?

At 7:45pm MSP Flight Ops transmitted that somone will have to take a look back and see if he's still there.
At 7:54pm MSP transmits "As soon as reasonably sure th e man has left the quicker u can land"

They're also consistantly giving 305 airport options at this stage. Cooper knows he's going. The crew know he's going too. They've seen him with the cord around his waist. They know the time is soon. NWO is genuine about the saftey of the crew and craft and they could be influenced by the psych who predicted he was going to jump then blowup the aircraft. For all they knew, Cooper could very well have left the bomb.

also a bit of afterthought but I believe MSP thinks that the aircraft can't make RENo in that config, however no Cooper, gear up, flaps in, and seeing it is the valid destination FBI etc has probably been set up there. It makes sense to continue there.

NWA didn't have any aircraft performance information for 727s flying in the configuration that Cooper demanded.  That is why the NWA aircraft performance engineers were continually asking for updates on the aircraft's indicated airspeed, altitude, outside air temperature, and the engine fuel flow rates.

And no one was certain that the airliner could even make it to Reno until it was in the Portland area and the NWA performance engineers had enough information to predict that it could get there.  In the meantime, the Air Traffic Control people were giving the airliner alternate airports that could handle it if it could not get to Reno.

In the short period of time I've dived into the Cooper case, I quickly realize that if you don't respect the person, you should question their opinions related to their "facts." It's both a simple and efficient filtering procedure. I've read your posts about the flight path of the aircraft. It's technically proficient. If anything, you should be the go to guy for anything related to it.
so that said wouldn't it be easy for the flight engineers to look at the drag, fuel, with the normal op performance of the 727 and do some simple math. The birds on the ground, they've yet to get a destination/demand. Once they get the destination, it would seem in everyone's best to scramble with the demands (esp aft stair down) on the most simplest, will it get there? MSP knows that flaps 15, gear down, aft stairs UP that they can't make Mexico. They're guessing (max) SFO, maybe PHX. On the ground, prior to take off theyre working on range, correct?

N467US, the NWA aircraft that was hijacked, was a Boeing 727-051 and it was delivered new to NWA in April 1965.  As such, it was a very early 727 and had a relatively short range, which I think was less than 2000 nautical miles under optimal conditions.  And the 10000 feet altitude, low airspeed, landing gear down, and flap considerations (I don't know if the wing leading edge Krueger flaps and moveable slats were deployed at the 15 degree setting), were something that was not optimal and NWA may not have had pertinent information on.

But I am sure that the NWA performance engineers were working on the range problem with the crew and everyone else once Cooper specified the aircraft configuration.  But basically, in the 45 minutes or so it took the airliner to fly from Seattle through the Portland area, the engineers were able to get the information from the crew about the fuel use under the actual flight conditions and they estimated the aircraft could make it to Reno and it did.

Here is a story along the same line.  In the mid-1960s, Boeing got a contract with NASA-Langley to do some flight tests on blown flaps.  The original 707 prototype (N70700) was the aircraft to be used and it was modified at Boeing Seattle for the program.  The modifications included running some ducts, for the air to blow the flaps, through the landing gear retraction areas.  Consequently, the landing gear could not be retracted.  The aircraft was flown from Seattle to the NASA facility at Langley AFB, VA (and eventually back to Seattle) with the landing gear locked down.  I understand it took two days for the trip across the country and I don't know how many stops for refueling.  I saw the aircraft flying a number of times in the Langley area and it was always with all four engines screaming bloody murder and the aircraft doing about 150 Knots.

This is excellent, R99. It helps to have a proper perspective based on Facts vs. myth, for a change.



   

One of the reasons they were worried about fuel was Rataczak went to 30 degrees on the flaps. this put an more drag on the plane. they would of never made it in that configuration. the plane levels off at 7,000 and slowing down to about 160 KIAS. soon after he switches to 30 degrees. the transcripts, or log shows the plane 14 miles DME at 7:40. this can not be met at the speed the plane was going. Rataczak said somewhere I recall about the stairs causing vibrations, and this was the reason he switched to 30 degrees, but that doesn't jive with the records. anyone have an answer on that one?

Cooper has the steps down somewhere close, or around McChord AFB.

9;30 rolls around, and they are not sure if Cooper is on the plane, so they ask to lower the cabin pressure to slow his reflexes down along with climbing to 11,000. who fell asleep after the oscillation, and the pressure bump earlier?

who fell asleep after the oscillation, and the pressure bump earlier?

who?   ?