D.B. Cooper expert doubts latest claims

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Source: Columbian (Vancouv= er, WA)

October 27, 2007

Byline: Don Hamilton

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Ralph Himmelsbach has heard every D.B. Cooper story there is to be heard, and he's dubious of the latest.

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"I= don't think very much of this," said Himmelsbach, a retired FBI agent and Co= oper expert. "I don't see any proof."

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What dr= ew his scorn was the latest theory as to the identity of the fabled hijacker, which comes by way of New York Magazine. In a story this week, the magazine repor= ted that a Morris, Minn., man believes the hijacker was actually his brother, Kenneth Christiansen, of Bonney Lake in Pierce County. The brother= , Lyle Christiansen, drew the attention of the New Yorkers, the story said, by try= ing to interest screenwriter Nora Ephron in a movie= about Kenneth.

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D.B. Co= oper, of course, has been part of Pacific Northwest mythology for the past 36 years. On Thanksgiving Eve 1971, he leapt from the back stairs of a Northwest Orient Airlines 727 into the dark and stormy woo= ds north of Washougal with $200,000 strapped to him. He was never heard from again.

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Many gr= eat mysteries get resolved. We know who Deep Throat was, that Oswald did it and Mrs. O'Leary's cow didn't.

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But eve= n with these latest revelations, we still don't know who D.B. Cooper was.

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The FBI= agrees, and the case remains open.

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Robbie Burroughs, spokeswoman for the Seattle FBI office, said the agency looked i= nto and dismissed Kenneth Christiansen as a suspect several years ago. He was brought to their attention by his brother, Lyle.

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"W= e ruled him out," Burroughs said. "Did he meet the threshold of the basic physical description? No, he didn't. Height, weight, sk= in tone, eye color. The witness was very clear on the eye color, She very distinctly remembers looking into his = brown eyes. This person had hazel eyes. He's not considered a viable suspect.&quo= t;

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Himmels= bach retired in 1980 after nine years as the lead FBI agent on the case. He lives today in Woodburn, = Ore., with Cooper still very much a pa= rt of his life. He wrote a 1986 book, "Norjack: = The Investigation of D.B. Cooper," keeps a copy of one of the $20 bills the airline paid in ransom and, with Bob Rataczak, the first officer on the Coo= per flight, appears in documentaries.

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He's be= en down these roads before. Other names have surfaced with a claim to Cooper's identity, the most prominent of them is Duane Weber, who told his wife just before he died that he was Cooper. The FBI dismissed the claim, and the case remains open. It's the nation's only unsolved hijacking. =

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The cas= e for Christiansen remains circumstantial.

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In the = New York Magazine article, Lyle Christiansen said his brother showed an affinity for= $20 bills, bore a general resemblance to sketches of the hijacker, worked as a flight attendant for Northwest Orient and was an Army paratrooper in 1945. =

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"I= 'm really sure it was him," "Lyle Christiansen told The= Columbian.

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But he = only has suspicions. These include his brother's deathbed proclamation that "There's something you should know, but I cannot tell you," which= he never expanded on. There's also his brother's role as a union steward at Northwest Orient; maybe he had a grudge against the company, although he ne= ver said anything about any grudge.

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Lyle Christiansen himself never linked D.C. Cooper to his brother until seeing t= he sketch of the hijacker on "Unsolved Mysteries" four years ago.

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He and = his older brother weren't particularly close. Kenneth came home to Morris maybe once a year, and they rarely talked otherwise. A= nd he has no idea what his brother was doing the week of the hijacking or whether= he suffered through any ordeal in the woods.

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Fine, Himmelsbach said, but where's the evidence?

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"I= t's all scratched together with an awful lot of assumptions and no way you can check," said Himmesl= bach, who once again finds himself answering D.B. Cooper media queries. "Mos= t of the people who could be helpful are unavailable or dead." <= /span>

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He does= n't remember seeing Christiansen's name as a possible suspect.

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Himmels= bach's life has been intertwined with the hijacking, right from the night it took place. He listened to the radio chatter between the pilot and the tower as = they made their plans.

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Cooper = -- or whatever his real name was -- got the $200,000 he sought and told the pilot= to "fly dirty," with flaps extended and wheels down, at 10,000 feet = and set a course for Mexico City. We can't make it that far, Capt. William Scott told him. OK, then Phoenix. Nope, th= e pilot said. What about Yuma, Ariz.? No, but we might make Reno, the pilot s= aid. Cooper agreed and they took off. As we know now, Cooper, the money and the parachutes all bailed out the rear stairwell of the Boeing 727 into the col= d, rainy night.

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No matt= er how good a parachutist he may have been, Himmelsbach said, he wasn't prepared f= or the task. When he jumped, the plane was traveling 170 knots, about 196 mph, with an air temperature outside the cabin a frosty 16 below zero.

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"M= y best, honest guess is that Cooper did not survive the hijacking. I have to go bac= k to all the circumstances of the jump itself. I know what the weather was becau= se I was up in it flying the next morning looking for him and the next night followed an airliner over the route in an army helicopter. I know the conditions and know the country.

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"H= e did not have the equipment he needed so desperately," Himmelsbach said. "He didn't bring it along, and didn't ask for it."

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There's= been no sign of either Cooper or his bright red and yellow parachutes since, despit= e an intensive search.

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On Feb.= 10, 1980, though, 8-year-old Brian Ingram dug up $5,800 in Cooper's $20 bills at Frenchman's Bar, the only hard evidence to surfa= ce. Last year, an attorney in Mena= , Ark., said Ingram would auc= tion the bills to collectors, but he has yet to follow through.

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For a l= ong time, the FBI kept some elements of the crime secret, saving them to help identify the real hijacker. But not any more, Himmelsbach said. =

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"T= here isn't anything left that hasn't been made public," he said.

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Don Hamilton can be reached at 360-759-810 and don.hamilton@columbian.c= om

To see more of The Columbian, or to subscrib= e to the newspaper, go to http://www.columbian.com.

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