On This Day

One of the great unsolved true crime mysteries of the 20th century.

D. B. Cooper hijacked a aircraft shortly after takeoff, showing a flight attendant something that looked like a bomb and informing the crew that he wanted $200,000 and four parachutes. When the plane landed in Seattle, authorities met Cooper’s demands and evacuated most of the passengers. Cooper then demanded that the plane fly toward Mexico at a low altitude and ordered the remaining crew into the cockpit.

At 8:13 p.m., as the plane flew over the Lewis River in southwest Washington, the plane’s pressure gauge recorded Cooper’s jump from the aircraft. Wearing only wraparound sunglasses, a thin suit, and a raincoat, Cooper parachuted into a thunderstorm with winds in excess of 100 mph and temperatures well below zero at the 10,000-foot altitude where he began his fall. The storm prevented an immediate capture, and authorities assumed he was killed during the jump. No trace of Cooper was found during a massive search.

In 1980, an eight-year-old boy uncovered nearly $5,880 of the ransom money on the bank of the Columbia River, five miles from Vancouver, Washington. The fate of Cooper remains a mystery.