The revelations from a private investigator. In the endless list of possible suspects of one of the most sensational and bloodless hijackings in history enters a new figure: Vince Petersen, long deceased
The DB Cooper case, the series continues. In the endless list of possible suspects of one of the most sensational and bloodless hijackings in history enters a new figure: Vince Petersen, long deceased.
End of November 1971, more or less as it was these days. A man dressed in dark using a fake bomb case takes control of a Northwest Orient 727 in service between Portland and Seattle. He bought the ticket in the (fake) name of Cooper, he looks like a traveling salesman, he says a few words. But they are enough. He forces the pilot to land, he gets 4 parachutes and $ 200,000 in exchange for the passengers, then orders the commander to leave. With precise indications: south route, altitude of 3,000 meters and trolley “out”.
He chose the right aircraft model, as it has a ladder under the tail, an indispensable detail for the success of the plan. Once the Boeing reaches an uninhabited area between Seattle and Reno, he takes off his tie which he abandons on board, lowers the ladder and si launch into the void wearing one of the parachutes. She has the loot bag tied to her wrist.
They will look for him far and wide, soldiers, police, amateur “hunters”, FBI. It will remain a ghost, engulfed by a wooded area in southern Washington state. From a pirate he becomes a legend, a living material for documentaries, films, ballads. Pursued by the Law and suppositions. In February 1980, silence about his fate is broken by the chance discovery of $ 5,800 in the ransom. They are half hidden in the sand along the bank of the Columbia River, when a child at the campsite with his parents discovered them. An important, non-decisive trace.
Theories will explode, it is not excluded that he died after the launch. The weather was bad, it was cold, it was not properly equipped. Others question the region where it might have ended up. And over time the potential “DB Cooper” will multiply, almost always individuals with a military or aeronautical past.
A very long list, with alleged deathbed confessions and people convinced that a relative was the culprit. A suggestive bond will emerge with a Franco-Belgian comic centered on the adventures of a Canadian fighter pilot, Dan Cooper. And many other tracks, worn out and with no outlets. Now Eric Ullis, private investigator, “obsessed” like many Americans with mystery, has entered the new candidate, Vince Petersen. And he did it based on the hijacker’s abandoned tie analysis.
Particles of titanium have emerged that lead – he says – to a single company, Crucible Industries of Pittsburg. And working on the employee profile he is convinced it was Vince – lab technician – organizing the shot. Reason? She was afraid of losing her job and so she had decided to find an alternative. As long as there was a real reason: one of the scenarios – which I believe – is that the pirate, whoever he is, did it only as a gesture of defiance, to prove he was capable of it. In front of the revelations, Petersen’s son, who died in 2002, claimed that his father had no throwing experience and reacted with surprise. Ullis, on the other hand, is sure of what he claims. As he was until some time ago when he had assumed that Sheridan Peterson had taken possession of the jet, a name almost the same as that of the last suspect. Now he has questioned everything. He is the beauty of yellow. The series continues.
November 12, 2022 (change November 12, 2022 | 10:30 am)
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