DB Cooper was a plane hijacker who vanished with a whopping $200,000 after holding everyone on the aircraft hostage.
Decades after his airborne crime, the FBI has opened Cooper’s case after a YouTuber discovered a shocking piece of evidence.
DB Cooper was never caughtAP1971
Cooper’s sinister plot
Cooper’s true identity is unknown but his plane ticket stated that his first name was Dan.
He boarded Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 on November 24, 1971, with the intention of holding everyone ransom.
The flight took off from Portland, Oregon and was bound for Seattle, Washington.
Sat in seat 18E, Cooper ordered a bourbon with 7UP and patiently waited to enact his terrifying plot.
Eventually, he discreetly handed flight attendant Florence Shaffner a note which read “Miss – I have a bomb and I want you to sit by me”.
At first, Florence didn’t read the note and simply put it in her bag, but Cooper leaned forward and whispered: “Miss, you better look at that note. I have a bomb.”
The flight attendant asked to see the bomb as she sat down next to the hijacker and he opened his briefcase to reveal four red cylinders attached to a large battery.
Convinced that she had seen a bomb, Florence headed to the cockpit to relay Cooper’s demands.
A heroic flight attendant
Florence remained in the cockpit, while another flight attendant named Tina Mucklow sat next to Cooper.
She remained extremely calm and gently talked to the hijacker.
Although he had grown angry when she asked him where he was from, Cooper continued talking to Tina.
Meanwhile Captain William A Scott relayed Cooper’s demands to Northwest Flight Operations.
He said: “[Cooper] requests $200,000 in a knapsack by 5:00pm.
“He wants two front parachutes, two back parachutes.
“He wants the money in negotiable American currency.”
Cooper had also said that he would release the hostages upon landing.
When Tina asked Cooper why he had targeted their plane, he made a chilling joke.
He said: “It’s not because I have a grudge against your airlines, it’s just because I have a grudge.”
Tina Mucklow (pictured) helped keep Cooper calmAP: Associated Press
Cooper released the hostages
The plane landed at Sea-Tac Airport, where Northwest’s Seattle operations manager, Al Lee, delivered the ransom money to Cooper.
After receiving the cash, Cooper released the passengers which left him and the cabin crew alone on the plane.
When he began inspecting the money, Tina jokingly asked if she could have some but had to refuse when he actually tried to give her some of the stolen cash.
Cooper released Florence and her fellow flight attendant Alice Hancock, after Alice calmly asked him if they could leave.
However, he demanded that Tina, Captain Scott, First Officer William J. Rataczak and Flight Engineer Harold E. Anderson remained on the aircraft.
They then took off again, bound for Mexico City.
An airborne getaway
Cooper forced the crew to leave the cabin unpressurized and asked that, when he asked, they lower the aft staircase.
Tina was the last person to see Cooper alive, as she pleaded with him to not lower the staircase.
When she retreated to the cockpit, she saw a warning light appear which indicated that he had opened the staircase and presumably jumped out with the parachute.
The plane finally landed safely at 11pm at Reno–Tahoe International Airport, with all of the flight crew on board.
DB Cooper forced the plane to take flight a second time, bound for Mexico CityAP: Associated Press
A shocking discovery
Cooper was never seen again and his identity was never uncovered.
For years, the only clue as to his whereabouts was the discovery of some of the stolen money by the Columbia River in 1980.
However, the discovery of a shocking new piece of evidence by a YouTuber has led the FBI to reopen the case.
Until now, the FBI had presumed that Cooper had died after making his fateful jump from the plane.
Dan Gryder was filming a video about the case when the siblings of a man named Richard Floyd McCoy reached out to him.
McCoy had been arrested for a similar hijacking just months after Cooper’s crime.
His siblings had discovered one of Cooper’s parachutes and made contact with the influencer, sparking a renewed interest in the case.
Cooper’s true identity remains a mystery but most witnesses described him as being 5 foot 10 inches tall with dark hair and no discernible accent.
True crime enthusiasts can catch Dan’s series about Cooper, named Probably Cause, on his YouTube channel ProbableCause-DanGryder.
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