New Forum & News Updates

[377]

I was unaware that ties were routinely worn in machine shops. Thats pretty crazy risk-wise. But people do really crazy stuff. A Navy A7 Corsair II jet crashed vertically into an apartment bldg in Alameda CA. The cause was believed to be that the pilot was SMOKING in an oxygen-rich flammable cockpit/O2 mask environment. He had bragged to other squadron members that he had perfected a way to do it safely.

377

[377]

Episode 12 with Marty Andrade is up now. Let me know what you guys think!

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Good job Darren!

I paid special attention to Marty's comments about the difficulty he experienced in donning an NB 6 or NB 8 rig (8 minutes) and how easy it was for his father, who had parachute experience (20 seconds). Also his comment about how well hidden the packing cards are on NB 6 and 8 is spot on. The packing card slot is cleverly concealed and nearly invisible from the exterior. A hint for Marty, it is not necessary to open the pack to find the card slot.

If we only knew whether Cooper actually pulled a packing card.  It would tell us so much about his level of parachuting experience. Tosaw wrote that  Tina saw Cooper pull the card. Himmelspach said Tosaw was dead wrong.

377

[fcastle866]

"Safe to say if the tie was Cooper's, then he was not a school teacher, a lawyer, a doctor, etc.  I'd personally like to hear people's recent thoughts on the tie."

The machined Al curls interest me. Ties are verboten on machine shop floors as they can get caught in rotating machinery with often fatal results.  I worked in the engineering machine shop in college and there were signs everywhere about no ties, necklaces or dangling hair. So how do machined tailings/turnings end up on a tie? There are explanations of course. Cooper was apparently in an environment where aluminum was machined but unlikely a machinist himself. 

The rich McCrone data is mind-blowing. So many clues, but no obvious solution that accounts for everything they found. I wish IBM would let WATSON crunch on the mystery for a while.

377

377,

I am in complete agreement that ties are not normally worn in machine shop environments.  Nevertheless, Tom Kaye can show you pictures of machinists wearing normal ties in such an environment.

I agree - there are exceptions to all rules. People violate the rules all the time. I remember a machine shop housed right next to the UI Ag and Labor Medicine Center on the UI Oakdale campus in the 70's with people running machinery and lathes with many professional staff doing machining wearing ties!  It was the  UI Ag and Labor Medicine Center that wrote laws for the State of Iowa/OSHA telling workers what dress codes in work sites should be! There were signs posted all over the place in machine shops saying: NO TIES! The rules were never enforced.

I don't envision Cooper wearing a clip on tie and hanging over a lathe or a drill press, but a shop foreman maybe, or a plant manager.  If a manager was required to wear a tie in a manufacturing environment, then it likely would have been a clip on.  You don't see ties as much now with the whole "business casual" thing, but back in the 70's you did.

As for the comment by EU about Cooper having special knowledge about the 727...that's one of those that could start another long discussion.  I'm of the belief that he did not have special knowledge of the 727, just info he picked up along the way.  Aviation knowledge yes, but 727, questionable. 

[georger]

I was unaware that ties were routinely worn in machine shops. Thats pretty crazy risk-wise. But people do really crazy stuff. A Navy A7 Corsair II jet crashed vertically into an apartment bldg in Alameda CA. The cause was believed to be that the pilot was SMOKING in an oxygen-rich flammable cockpit/O2 mask environment. He had bragged to other squadron members that he had perfected a way to do it safely.

377

Typical bureaucratic snafu. You had people running places that had no practical experience. EX cop running a center in which there are machine shops. Everyone was "ordered" to be presentable and wear ties! To hell with OSHA. So people would turn the shop in to OSHA - then all hell would break lose, Four people fired for snitching on the EX cop supervisor, then more hell would break lose, then they close the whole damned facility and open a new office with only two people ... the EX cop and his secretary.

I dont no where you have been hiding protected your whole life but millions of people went through shit like this every day of their working lives ....... at the end got buried with clip on ties on! 

Politics controlled the whole process and its even more political now than then! It's like the Dark Ages .

[georger]

NEWS: THE DB COOPER TRAIL

A small group of recreational people in the State of Washington, is about to ask for the establishment of 'the DB Cooper Trail'. They hope to get approval from the Washington State Legislature, with funding to mark out the trail with appropriate signage, camping, and recreational sites along the route of the trail. The group sees this as the beginning of an effort to formally mark out the route the Cooper plane followed, from Seattle to Vancouver Portland. The route chosen will follow the FBI flight path map.

It appears this is a small independent group of recreational, hiking, and biking enthusiasts with no particular affiliation to anyone involved in Cooper research past or present, or Cooper political forums. One member of the group has hiked the Appalachian Trail and says that in part was the basis for his interest in this idea. The group may start taking public comment soon, once an appropriate website has been established. 

Perhaps a poll here is in order?

[georger]

The Washington Trails Association, has been contacted in regard to the DB Cooper Trail. The proposed trail will be following the flight path 305 took. [The approved FBI flight path]. 

Washington Trails Association
705 2nd Ave, Suite 300
WTA
(206) 625-1367
Seattle, WA 98104
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PS: BTW this is real! This effort began, Im told, with a  serious extreme biker group in Colorado that has connections in Washington. This group has backing. These are serious people with serious political and financial backing! This could result in a serious formalisation of the DB Cooper flight path (trail) formalised by authorities in Washington and the US Forest Service! Anyone with a competing flight path had better  get your acts together! The DB Cooper FBI flight path may very soon achieve formal status!

 

[Shutter]

Lady and Gents:

Hope you're all revving up the BBQ or joining family/friends today. It's beautiful in Los Angeles (after yesterday's rains).

This holiday always leaves me grateful to those who have helped serve the public. Whether on the battlefield, from a squad car, in a classroom, in a courtroom -- or even while working a stubborn cold case for justice -- thank you.

You folks have been so generous and patient during my years on the Cooper learning curve. In that regard, I wanted to alert you to a long-form investigative article that's coming (5-7000 words) in the next month or two, focused on Rackstraw's Cooper and CIA connections. This journalist has been digging up details and FOIA records for four months now -- details my (now disbanded) team missed.

He asked me for all nine press-release summaries -- I've decided to post them for all, including Forum members, up at the "Smoking Gun" section of our website homepage. I suggest you particularly scrutinize the back pages on the 2/1/18 news release:  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login

I also suggest you read the short new summary, posted below the video link, here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login 

With hat in hand and all due respect, I just want you all to be prepared for the inevitable conclusions that are coming.

Comments always welcome. Until then, all my best.

God bless,

Tom

[Shutter]

Taking time to remember my father......

.

[Bruce A. Smith]

A very loving tribute, Shut.

[Shutter]

A very loving tribute, Shut.

Thanks, it's just a post of remembrance. I didn't post anything last year. my father was proud of his service in the Navy and should be. I just like to think he's watching over me and can see I'm keeping his memory alive. 

[fcastle866]

Lady and Gents:

Hope you're all revving up the BBQ or joining family/friends today. It's beautiful in Los Angeles (after yesterday's rains).

This holiday always leaves me grateful to those who have helped serve the public. Whether on the battlefield, from a squad car, in a classroom, in a courtroom -- or even while working a stubborn cold case for justice -- thank you.

You folks have been so generous and patient during my years on the Cooper learning curve. In that regard, I wanted to alert you to a long-form investigative article that's coming (5-7000 words) in the next month or two, focused on Rackstraw's Cooper and CIA connections. This journalist has been digging up details and FOIA records for four months now -- details my (now disbanded) team missed.

He asked me for all nine press-release summaries -- I've decided to post them for all, including Forum members, up at the "Smoking Gun" section of our website homepage. I suggest you particularly scrutinize the back pages on the 2/1/18 news release:  You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login

I also suggest you read the short new summary, posted below the video link, here: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login 

With hat in hand and all due respect, I just want you all to be prepared for the inevitable conclusions that are coming.

Comments always welcome. Until then, all my best.

God bless,

Tom

What is "the inevitable" that is coming?  I'm assuming Tom is Tom Colbert.

[georger]

People turning lead into gold - an endless supply of them! When the problem was so simple to begin with. Was there a King Arthur? Either yes or no!!! Maybe there were twenty of them? 

Bring in the clowns.

[Shutter]

I've lost a lot of interest in this case for several reasons. I have decided to take a break from Cooper for a while. the insults are not going to get anything accomplished. try and actually get something done in my absence.

I will check in daily looking over the comments and will remove any that doesn't reflect researching that guy, what's his name......Cooper. I tend to forget while flipping through the garbage. I wake up and look here, TMN, and the DZ and see the same shit.

I've said it a hundred times. I'm far from perfect myself but I do try and attack the data vs the person. I closed the registration until I feel it's worth someone joining here. I actually envy Flyjack. he's doing what I USE to do. dig deep. I would like to get that sparkle back in my eye again and get back to doing the same.

Shutter

[EU]

The dysfunction in this case is obvious. It is the by-product of four groups of people.

Group 1: These are the people who visit the site and do not actively contribute. There is nothing wrong with this type of engagement.

Group 2: These are the people who visit the site and contribute in a neutral capacity. There is nothing wrong with this type of engagement.

Group 3: These people actively research and study the case and attempt to explain the mystery. Needless to say this case is complicated and there is a lot of bad information out there--even in the FBI files--therefore, different people will interpret different things differently. There is nothing wrong with this type of engagement.

Group 4: These people just suck. Plain and simple. No reason mincing words about this group. They attack other people irrespective of whether they be from Group 1, 2 or 3. They contribute virtually nothing of substance. Their argument, if there even is one, rests upon platitudes, condescension and snarkyness. They think they know more than everyone else and cannot tolerate anyone who thinks differently and think that everyone gives a crap to read their tired rhetoric non-stop. They are also the primary reason why people in Group 1 don't join either Group 2 or Group 3. There is a lot wrong with this type of engagement.

To be sure, we have some people who jump between Group 3 and Group 4. My suggestion to these types: Stay in Group 3.

Cheers!

[Bruce A. Smith]

A very loving tribute, Shut.

Thanks, it's just a post of remembrance. I didn't post anything last year. my father was proud of his service in the Navy and should be. I just like to think he's watching over me and can see I'm keeping his memory alive.

I'm not a hung-ho kinda guy in the usual sense for a lot of reasons - Vietnam is one. My father is another. He just ASSUMED I was going into the Army and would fight in VN, and never expressed (to me, at least) any concern for my welfare or safety, let along what I might have to do over there to survive. Plus there are plenty of other issues.

Nevertheless, I do appreciate my Dad being in WW II and doing what was asked of him by the Armed Forces and the people around him. He was a captain in Army Ordnance and shared the command for a battalion of mechanics. He was a capable, fair-minded, and honest officer for the most part, I figure, but far from a John Wayne type of soldier. Rather, he was a corporate guy and saw fighting the Nazis as a business task. He loved WW II, but he also knew full well its horrors. During the Battle of the Bulge he had to evacuate his forward base near the action and retreat to a small town just south of Brussels. There he was able to snag a jeep every week and go visit his aunt and niece in Brussels, who had to ride out the war due to immigration issues with the USA. His aunt never spoke in public because she spoke her French with an American accent - and she lived across the street from Gestapo HQ. So Dad knew the score on things.