He asked for a drink, handed a note to a flight attendant, and by that evening had vanished into the clouds with $200,000 and a parachute. Decades later, nobody knows who he really was.
The Hijacking
On the afternoon of November 24, 1971, a quiet man in a business suit who gave his name as Dan Cooper bought a one-way ticket on Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305, a Boeing 727 flying from Portland, Oregon to Seattle, Washington. Once airborne, he handed flight attendant Florence Schaffner a note claiming he had a bomb in his briefcase. He ordered bourbon and soda while she read it.
The Ransom
Cooper demanded $200,000 in cash and four parachutes. When the plane landed in Seattle, he released all 36 passengers in exchange for the money and parachutes, keeping the flight crew aboard. He then ordered the plane back into the air, told to head toward Mexico City at a low altitude with the landing gear down.
The Jump
Somewhere between Seattle and Reno, Nevada, a little after 8 p.m., Cooper lowered the plane's rear staircase and jumped into the night with the ransom money strapped to him. He was never seen again. The crew landed safely; Cooper simply vanished into dense, cold forest terrain in the middle of the night, wearing only a business suit.
A 45-Year Investigation
The FBI's investigation, code-named NORJAK, became one of the longest in the bureau's history. Investigators considered more than 1,000 suspects over the decades, interviewed hundreds of witnesses, and searched extensively for physical evidence. In 1980, a boy found a decaying bundle of cash along the Columbia River, later confirmed by serial number to be part of Cooper's ransom money -- the only physical trace of the money ever recovered. The rest, along with Cooper himself, was never found.
The FBI Closes the Case
On July 8, 2016, the FBI officially redirected resources away from the case, ending 45 years of active investigation, making it the only unsolved commercial airline hijacking in U.S. history. The agency said it would still accept new physical evidence directly related to the parachutes or money, but would no longer actively pursue the case.
New Files, Still No Answers
In October 2025, the FBI released a large batch of previously unseen files from the investigation, revealing new detail about Cooper's apparent flight knowledge and the FBI's pursuit of hundreds of suspects, including a favored candidate, Richard Floyd McCoy Jr. Despite the new material, the files provided no definitive answer, and Cooper's true identity remains unknown.
FAQ
Was D.B. Cooper ever identified?
No. Despite one of the most extensive investigations in FBI history, his true identity has never been confirmed.
Was any of the ransom money ever found?
Yes, a small portion (about $5,800) was found along the Columbia River in 1980; the rest was never recovered.
Is the case still being investigated?
The FBI officially stopped active investigation in 2016, though it will still accept genuinely new physical evidence tied to the parachutes or money.