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Locksmiths talking about locksmith stuff
Wednesday, 11/24/1971. The man wearing a dark suit, sunglasses, and a parachute stood at the back of the Northwest Orient Airlines plane. Steadying himself, he pulled the lever and lowered the rear air stairs on the Boeing seven twenty seven. A couple of minutes later, and he was falling towards the ground. This hijacking spurred hundreds of theories and changed the way aircraft were secured for decades later.
Tim Coleman:I'm Tim Coleman.
Tyler J. Thomas:I'm Tyler j Thomas.
Jeff Moss:And I'm Jeff Maas. Together, we will explore and discuss these events from the perspective of over thirty years of combined locksmith and door hardware experience. This is The Three Tumblers. Now, the DB Cooper van.
Tim Coleman:The jet age was well underway by the late nineteen fifties, and there was a huge demand for a high performance jet capable of making short range runs between cities while carrying more passengers in a comfortable aircraft. Carrying between one hundred six and one hundred twenty nine people at a time for distances up to 2,590 miles, Boeing met the need on 02/01/1964 when the seven twenty seven was launched. Before the jet age, when modern airlines were in operation, this flight would have been handled by a propeller driven aircraft and it would have taken longer. Propeller driven aircraft have to fly lower, and they're very noisy. So to have a jet that is able to make this run, a relatively short run and carry more people in it, it allowed for a much more efficient use of time and therefore made the airline more money.
Tim Coleman:In the nineteen sixties, not all airports were capable of handling jet aircraft that required longer runways for takeoff and landing. But engineers at Boeing managed to develop a plane that could not only accommodate six across seating, it could take off and land from runways as short as 4,500 feet long. When boarding or disembarking, passengers didn't have the modern passenger boarding bridges that we do today.
Tyler J. Thomas:We certainly didn't. Planes relied heavily on air stairs to board and de plane passengers back then. Every time you see the president getting on Air Force one, that's pretty much how everybody got on and off flights at the time. Although some would enter an exit from the rear of the plane. I can't imagine having people walking on ramps these days, so I'm glad we don't do that anymore.
Tyler J. Thomas:As for the runways, keep in mind that air travel started with those propeller powered planes, the prop planes. And it stayed that way until the late nineteen fifties when the seven zero seven and DC eight were introduced. So decades of building a lot of airports and runways to accommodate planes that don't need as much takeoff room, they're already in place. Kind of hard to change that overnight. For comparison, most runways at airports today are in the order of seven to 13,000 feet in length.
Tyler J. Thomas:So for Boeing to pull this off with a jet plane that can work on these smaller runways, that's gonna help bridge the gap before airports, runways, all that can be updated and everybody can catch up.
Tim Coleman:Northwest Orient Airlines flight 305 boarded on the afternoon of 11/24/1971. One of the last passengers to board was a man in his mid forties with dark hair, brown eyes, wearing a black business suit with a white shirt and thin black tie. He sat down in Seat 18 E and ordered a bourbon in seven Up. The six year old seven twenty seven with registration number N467US began pre takeoff procedures and was soon climbing at a 160 miles per hour. This flight from Portland to Seattle was considered a milk run by both crew and regular passengers alike.
Tim Coleman:However, on this day, flight three zero five would be anything but normal.
Jeff Moss:Yeah. So by all accounts, this was a normal flight, you know, a basic hour business type of trip. Nothing really fancy or out of the ordinary. The guy looked normal, you know, Joe Average type of thing. Pretty normal for the time.
Jeff Moss:You know, didn't look like a hippie or anything like that in the seventies. Just looked like a straight laced kind of normal average business person.
Tim Coleman:While captain William Scott, first officer Bill Radishek, and flight engineer Harold Anderson made sure the aircraft was flying as it should be, flight attendants Alice Hancock, Tina Muklow and Florence Schaffner made sure that their 36 passengers were comfortable. Just after takeoff, the man in Seat 18 E handed a note to Schaffner who was sitting just behind him at the rear of the plane. Florence thought it was just another name and number of a businessman looking to kill time when they landed and nearly threw it away. But mister Dan Cooper said, miss, you'd better look at that note. I have a bomb.
Tyler J. Thomas:Passing notes to flight attendants is common. In fact, I saw it two days ago when I was flying to New York because it can be hard to hear on these flights especially back then. I imagine now like then some of these notes are flirtatious in manner and I'm sure that this flight attendant had to deal with this all the time so I can see why she was quick to dismiss it. With regards to the passengers on board, this was the night before Thanksgiving. Cooper knew this flight wasn't gonna be even halfway full and he was right because it was roughly a third full.
Tyler J. Thomas:So why would he want this? Well keep listening.
Tim Coleman:After seeing what appeared to be a bomb in the man's briefcase, she writes down his demands and delivers them to Captain Scott. Cooper wants $200,000 in a knapsack, two front parachutes and two back parachutes. He also specified that when they landed in Seattle, the plane was to be filled to capacity with fuel on the tarmac with the passengers still aboard. Once he had the money and they were gassed up, he would let the passengers go. The parachutes would be the last items delivered to him.
Jeff Moss:Yeah. And he had very specific demands of exactly what he wanted, no substitutions, and he made a lot of small talk with the, flight attendants that he knew about the area that he wanted to land over. So I sounds like he did some reconnaissance where he was from that area. Not a 100% sure on that regard, but I guess it was a man with a plan, you would say.
Tim Coleman:At 07:40PM, the seven twenty seven was airborne again. PM, This time headed to Mexico City with a refueling stop planned at Reno. The hijacker had made very specific demands of the flight crew to travel at the slowest speed possible, about a 115 miles per hour, the flaps at 15 degrees, and the landing gear down. He also wanted the rear air stairs to be down during takeoff, but the officials with Northwest Orient wouldn't allow it. Tina Muklow was the only crew member to remain in the passenger cabin with Cooper while the rest were inside the cockpit.
Tim Coleman:Just a few moments after takeoff, Cooper told her to lower the air stairs, but she refused out of fear of being sucked out of the aircraft. He settled on her showing him how to lower the air stairs himself and told her to go join the others in the cockpit. Just after 8PM, a warning light flashed on the flight deck indicating the rear air stairs had been lowered. And just like that, Cooper was gone. Now these air stair doors are hydraulically lifted, but they're gravity fed to drop.
Tim Coleman:So when you're mid air, there's nothing really pushing those stairs down. Flying at this speed, the airflow is going to buffet that air stairs upwards. So it was a pretty rough ride. I mean, I imagine that when he was out there, those stairs were kind of fluttering up and down. And even the crew reported later when they were debriefed by the FBI, they felt a lurch just after the change in cabin pressure, which occurred after the airstair indicator light was activated.
Tim Coleman:There's winds of over a 100 miles an hour outside. He's going out with this parachute, a bag of cash, and whatever else he has on him and trying to jump out. So it's not as easy as you might think it is as just simply walking down some stairs and jumping off into the middle of the night. With the FBI having been involved since the flight crew first called in the hijacking, the investigation was already well underway. After landing in Reno, the FBI bomb squad cleared the seven twenty seven and found no signs of a bomb or of the hijacker.
Tim Coleman:Agents and cops began questioning potential suspects right away, but came up empty. J Edgar Hoover even authorized use of the S r 71 Blackbird to fly over the path and take high resolution photos to aid in the search. Within days, a sketch was released to the media. Reporters caught word that police had interviewed a person by the name of DB Cooper and although he had nothing to do with the crime, his name was reported around the world and has stuck ever since.
Jeff Moss:So it would really suck if your name was DB Cooper, Your name was used by accident for a famous event. I remember when the creator of Sesame Street died and there was a thing in the paper that said Jeffrey Moss passed away. Little bit different, but this was an interesting occurrence where the FBI authorized the use of the s r 71 Blackbird plane for recognizance, which was not supposed to be used on American airspace. Rules rules can be changed when the government needs to do something, I guess.
Tim Coleman:The Federal Air Marshal Program was not having a good year, to say the least, with this widely publicized incident. Baggage searches weren't required at the time and even considered to be rude. In spite of an airliner with passengers and crew being held for a ransom that is worth over $1,500,000 today, security at airports did not increase right away. 1972 was the year of airline hijackings. Over a dozen people attempted to use the same tactics Cooper did.
Tim Coleman:While most were thwarted, some like Richard Charles Lapointe and Richard McCoy, managed to actually bail out of the plane midair. Although, they were later caught.
Tyler J. Thomas:Let's go back in history for a second. Between 1958 and 1960, there were 17 hijackings associated with Cuban rebels and militants. Now these were all secluded to Cuban Airlines but by 1961, they started targeting US airlines with three being targeted in less than three weeks. So as things are heating up, this Air Force general has an idea that, hey, maybe we should put armed security on these commercial flights now that these hijackers are targeting US planes. JFK agrees and orders that the federal, law enforcement officers start being deployed on high risk flights.
Tyler J. Thomas:A year later, the Federal Air Marshal Service begins with 18 volunteers. They get extensive training from the US Border Patrol and FBI. Between 1962 and 1968, there's actually a decrease in hijackings in The US so the program is considered a success initially. But 1969 rolls around and hijackings start increasing again, spurned largely by events in The Middle East this time. So they decide, hey, the program needs to be expanded.
Tyler J. Thomas:By 1970, they've hired 1,700 additional people. But it takes time to train these officers effectively so there's a lull before we start seeing them deployed in a meaningful manner and results happening. In 1972, there's 31 hijackings with 15 demanding parachutes just like Cooper. Eventually, they figure out though, hey, the easiest thing for us to do is to start screening passengers so they can't smuggle knives or fake real bombs or whatever. So in 1973, the FAA enacts mandatory screening on all commercial flights.
Tyler J. Thomas:It works. I mean, that's why they're still using it today. It's not to say that hijacking stopped. They didn't. But they were being dramatically decreased by simply checking what passengers were bringing on board.
Tim Coleman:While modern jet bridges were in use at some larger airports, most passengers had to board and disembark on movable stairs that were brought up to the aircraft. The Boeing seven twenty seven, McDonnell Douglas DC nine, MD 80, and MD nineties all had built in air stairs in the tail of the plane, making it easier for operations in smaller airports that had limited resources. After the Northwest Orient Airlines hijacking and the copycats that followed, the need for a way to lock these stairs in flight was apparent. These planes were some of the most common throughout the world, and they were in very high use carrying thousands of passenger every year. When the d b Cooper incident happened, you had this sort of need to secure these people.
Tim Coleman:You had to deter people from using the same means of escape from the plane. And not only was it the seven twenty seven that had it, these other aircraft had it. So all of these aircraft combined had thousands of people flying on them every single year, and the airlines and authorities wanted to make them safe from future hijacking incidents like we saw with Dee Dee Cooper. That drove them to develop a locking mechanism for these stairs. The air stairs needed to be locked while the aircraft was in flight, but also needed to be able to be opened easily when on the ground.
Tim Coleman:The design also needed to be easy to retrofit onto existing aircraft. So any type of hydraulic locking mechanism that required extensive modifications was out of the question.
Jeff Moss:So if you give an engineer and a tradesman a problem to solve, they can solve it. You know, if you just say, here's what I need to do. Here's my problem. Figure it out. Guys can put their heads together and and come up with the solution usually fairly simply.
Jeff Moss:May have to brainstorm a little bit, but by and large, we can get it done.
Tim Coleman:The solution that followed was simple yet elegant. An aluminum paddle, roughly the shape of a fish fin, is connected at a 90 degree angle to a metal plate and is spring loaded, keeping the plate out of the way of the stairs. When the aircraft picks up speed, the wind pushes the paddle and makes it rotate, moving the plate across the hatch. No keys needed and only powered by the wind. This lock was the end of hijackers making their escape through the back door.
Tyler J. Thomas:KISS, keep it simple stupid, this device was that. It required no thought or action from this crew. It had one moving part, it's not like it was a routine maintenance concern. And it only needed wind to work, which must be there. You're not flying anyways.
Tyler J. Thomas:So when Tim told me about this device, it immediately reminded me of the roof flaps on stock cars. They're basically large fins on an axle, and they're secured by steel tethers. So if a NASCAR driver starts going sideways, these flaps are lifted up by the wind and act like a emergency spoiler of sorts to help them keep the car grounded. Wildly different purposes, but a similar concept, and both are tried and true because they're simple.
Tim Coleman:In February 1980, eight year old Brian Ingram was playing on a sandbar of the Columbia River while camping with his family. Digging in the sand, he found three packets of cash totaling nearly $6,000. This money was later confirmed to have been part of the ransom given to Deebee Cooper. After following thousands of leads, the FBI announced in July 2016 that their investigation into the case was suspended.
Tyler J. Thomas:I first heard about this story when I was a kid, and it fascinated me because it was such a brazen hijacking. And then the fact that we don't know who he is, we don't know what happened to him, that just adds to the mystique. Not for not trying, the FBI has worked on this for decades, but they didn't have a lot to work with. They had a tie that had some DNA evidence on it and a rare metal, which helped them, you know, determine, hey. It could be somebody working at this plant down the road.
Tyler J. Thomas:That never panned out. They had a partial fingerprint, but that's really all they had to work with besides the description of the guy. The fact that he was never found, though, isn't very I I don't think it works one way or the other because there are hundreds of aircraft that have been lost and never found in North America. And we're talking big airplanes, steel, metal, stuff that doesn't deteriorate right away. They can't find that.
Tyler J. Thomas:So if he was deceased or died, during the jump, parachute, whatever it may be, you know, I don't think that plays one way that he survived or he didn't. The other thing too, the the the money found, they did research on this independently and the FBI and and determined that that area was underwater at the time, so the money couldn't have been buried. And because of particles, silicates, whatever it was, they determined that, no, that cash was left there after the fact. That weighs heavily to that he survived the junk and started at least hoarding some of the cash somewhere, you would think. But, you know, it's it's all fun to speculate.
Tyler J. Thomas:That's what makes this case fun. That's why they have a convention every year in Seattle. That's why there are numerous, civilians out there, forums, message boards, Facebook groups, working, postulating, coming up with ideas, theories. I mean, it's it's just exercise, a fun brain teaser. But I'd like to think that he survived, but he never used the money apparently because they never found it.
Tyler J. Thomas:So who knows?
Tim Coleman:As airports modernized and became what we are used to today, the need for air stairs built into airplanes decreased. The last Boeing seven twenty seven rolled off the line in 1984 with 1,832 built. All major operators of the aircraft ceased using them by the early two thousands. The aircraft that was hijacked by Dan Cooper was used by Northwest Orient Airlines for several more years before being sold to Piedmont Airlines and finally to a charter company before being scrapped for parts at a Memphis Boneyard in 1996. The seven twenty seven was an absolute workhorse of the airline industry for decades.
Tim Coleman:Unfortunately, noise complaints about its engines. It was very, very noisy, and more efficient models that could carry more passengers surpassed it. I actually got to fly on one of these when I was a kid, about 11 years old, and I loved it because I had a little toy model of a seven twenty seven. It was one of my favorites, and getting to fly on one was just absolutely amazing. Although the seven twenty seven is a rare bird to see these days, it still carries a lasting reminder of the only unsolved and most infamous airline hijacking in American history, the DB Cooper vein.
Jeff Moss:Executive producer is Tyler j Thomas. Technical producer is Jeff Moss. Writer and editor is Tim Coleman.
Tyler J. Thomas:For source materials, see our website, 3tumblers.com. Get this episode and others wherever you get your podcasts.
Tim Coleman:This has been a Three Tumblers production. Copyright 2024. All rights reserved.