DB Cooper

[snowmman 3]

georger said: "The period Feb 1-10 shows
nothing unusual imo. If you want charts for a
certain period let me know "

how did they measure tide? I thought the water level was affected by rain/snowmelt etc. How can they split out the tide effect?

I was thinking while we have the tide levels, we don't have the temporary levels due to runoff.

[snowmman 3]

Quote

The round cargo items I don't recognize. Fuel containers? Actually they resemble the Skip Bombs used by British bombers in WW 2 to take out the Ruhr Valley dams.
377

The obligatory video of such bouncing bombs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JqBiMgC2Wg&feature=related

fatal American trial here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3ohMEZ-d3I&feature=related

more detail on use against dams by the English,in 1943
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrN0iVJjLgU&feature=related

[snowmman 3]

Good overview of the sensors and interpreting systems used in Vietnam

http://home.att.net/~c.jeppeson/igloo_white.html

[377 22]

377 practicing for NORJACK 2: Slovenia.

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[377 22]

How about that CAPETOWN callsign in your earlier link? It all comes back to SA.

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[snowmman 3]

Quote

How about that CAPETOWN callsign in your earlier link? It all comes back to SA.

377

funny. I actually wrote a line that highlighted that, but deleted it because I thought Orange1 would finally say "Enough!".

But it shows you actually read these posts! Cool.
I have to get more obscure though. You're on to me.

[snowmman 3]

Quote

377 practicing for NORJACK 2: Slovenia.

377

Excellent!

Now, the regular reader might say: "Why Slovenia?"
Well because it's the 100th anniversary this year of the first powered aircraft over Slovenia. (1909).

It was a biplane naturally, so 377, your training is right on track.

http://www.bsi.si/en/banknotes-and-coins.asp?MapaId=1292&Pisava=2

In that year, too, the aviation enthusiasts and brothers Edvard and Josip Rusjan made their first aircraft, the EDA I, which was 12 metres long and had a biplane wingspan of 8 metres. This aircraft first flew in November: at a height of two metres it flew for 60 metres. This was not merely hops, but actually the first proper powered flight, during which the aircraft consistently responded to commands. The Rusjan brothers prepared the EDA I again for flight, and on 29 November 1909 during a flight at Male Rojce pri Gorici the aircraft rose 12 metres into the air and flew for 600 metres. The flight could have been even longer if Edvard had known that everything was all right with the aircraft. He opted to land and calmly lowered the craft onto the meadow. The brothers, who reported regularly to Vienna, wrote in their report that "during the flight the aircraft described a fine circle". Reporters wrote that "Edvard flew around Roje at a speed of 40 km an hour". The brothers planned to perform the third series of flights on 6 December 1909, but there was an accident and the EDA II aircraft was almost destroyed. The Rusjan brothers scavenged the usable parts of the aircraft and constructed the EDA III.

Edvard Rusjan (6 July 1886 – 9 January 1911) was a Slovenian aircraft constructor and aviator who made the first flight in Slovenia, in the biplane EDA I. He built the plane together with his brother Josip. The Rusjan brothers made technical improvements to their aircraft, producing at least six different versions. In Zagreb they wanted to set up a factory for series production and sales of aircraft. In 1910 they made a prototype aircraft capable of taking off after just 28 metres on the runway, which at that time was a world record. During a tour of Balkan cities, on 9 January 1911 owing to bad weather Edvard Rusjan crashed at the foot of the Belgrade fortress of Kalemegdan and was fatally injured.

[snowmman 3]

The previous post highlighted the date of the 2nd flight.

The first flight was a couple days earlier.

Now what date you may ask:

11/25/1909...roughly aligning with Norjak on 11/24

You can see the 11/25/09 date here
http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/waf/slovenia/af/slovaf2.htm

[snowmman 3]

source: http://articles.latimes.com/1986-11-17/local/me-3915_1

Friend of Hasenfus - CIA Airline Veteran Flew for Contras, Missed Fatal Sortie

By PATRICK MCDONNELL, Times Staff Writer
November 17, 1986

CARLSBAD — When Bill Cooper telephoned last June, Dan Gamelin didn't hesitate. A month later, the San Diego County man was flying missions over Central America, supplying weapons to contra rebels fighting the Nicaraguan government.
"He just called, pretty much out of the blue, and asked if I wanted to go to work," recalled Gamelin, a brawny, blue-eyed welder who lives in this middle-class beachfront community north of San Diego.

Few details were discussed during that initial telephone conversation, Gamelin said, but he knew the job would be dangerous. Above all else, Gamelin trusted William J. Cooper, even though he hadn't spoken to the Reno pilot for two years and hadn't worked with him in more than a decade. Such were the bonds they and others forged during the Vietnam War while flying together in high-risk missions throughout Southeast Asia.
"When Bill Cooper said, 'We need you,"' Gamelin explained, "you didn't sit there and question it."

Gamelin said he would take the job.

A month and a few telephone calls later, the two men and Eugene Hasenfus, another colleague from Vietnam days, met at Miami International Airport. Soon, the three aging warriors were on their way to El Salvador, embarking on a mission that would end on Oct. 5, when Nicaraguan troops shot down a cargo plane carrying arms for anti-Sandinista contra rebels. Cooper, the 62-year-old pilot of the aircraft, was among the three men killed. Hasenfus, 45, who was captured when he parachuted to safety, remains a prisoner in Nicaragua.

(Hasenfus was convicted Saturday of supplying arms to contra rebels and sentenced to 30 years imprisonment by a Nicaraguan court.)

Gamelin says he could easily have been aboard that final flight. However, he acknowledges participating in the contra supply operation for four months and working with Cooper and Hasenfus on an unspecified number of missions throughout Central America. The three men, all ex-employees of Air America, the former CIA-owned airline, apparently were at the core of a network of fliers who operated the covert supply operation.

Gamelin, whose name was found on documents aboard the aircraft wreckage and whose home telephone number was among those dialed from a San Salvador safe house used during the operation, agreed to talk generally about the mysterious supply program. But many details--including the origins of its financial support--still remain murky about the operation, which, according to recovered documents made public by Nicaraguan officials, involved more than 70 flights between December, 1985, and the final mission last month.

Gamelin says he has agreed to talk about the missions only to elicit support for a fund-raising drive, called the Eugene Hasenfus Support Fund, that he and one other Air America colleague have set up in the Pacific Savings Bank in Carlsbad. He said the proceeds are to be used to assist Hasenfus' wife and three children, and, if there is any surplus, the family of Wallace Blaine (Buzz) Sawyer Jr., the co-pilot from Arkansas who was also killed in the crash.

"Gene's family needs the help; they've got to pay bills," said Gamelin, who spoke at his comfortable home here in a den decorated with model World War II-era bombers and a color photograph of an airborne C-123 cargo plane similar to the one shot down on Oct. 5. "I sometimes wish I could trade places with Gene in the slammer down there for a while, but I can't."

Despite reports of potential CIA involvement in the contra supply operation, Gamelin says he saw no evidence of any official U.S. cooperation. He says Cooper did the hiring and recruiting. Pressing Cooper for more details about the operation's backers would have violated the group's unwritten code, he says, adding that there was, however, a kind of unspecified understanding.

"I think they (U.S. officials) knew what we were doing, and naturally condoned what we were doing. I think a lot of people out there want to fight these Communists, especially when they hit our continent," said Gamelin, a bespectacled Midwesterner whose mild manner belies his many brushes with danger. "Bill Cooper was the boss . . . Gene (Hasenfus) and I, we were just the coolies."

The contra air supply operation, Gamelin insists, was ill-equipped and under-funded from the outset. All hands were required to pitch in to assist on fueling and loading the aircraft, he says. Airborne navigational gear was outdated, he says, and the contra fighters on the ground lacked the equipment and training to correctly prepare "drop zones" where supplies were to be delivered via parachute. Consequently, he said, relatively dangerous daylight flights were substituted for the more ideal nighttime missions. Captured documents show missions from air bases in El Salvador, Honduras and Costa Rica, with occasional resupply trips to the United States.

We had 30-year-old Korean War (era) equipment and they (the Sandinistas) had the latest Soviet equipment," said Gamelin, grinning at reports of a super-sophisticated spy operation. "We ran this on a shoestring . . . That's why Cooper wanted to get people who had experience, who knew what they were doing . . . If we did have all the money people say we had, we wouldn't have been banged out of the sky . . . Sometimes they didn't have money to pay us. There was not all this money coming in, secret money."

Both Gamelin and Hasenfus had extensive experience as "kickers"--cargo handlers--during their service with Air America. In Southeast Asia and in Central America, their duty was identical: to prepare loads of up to five tons of ammunition, food and other supplies for airborne deliveries that often would be made while experiencing severe turbulence and facing enemy fire. It is a difficult, hazardous task that requires technical expertise, precise timing and faith in your colleagues' abilities, according to the fliers.

"It's like a ballet, but a ballet on a roller coaster--and a ballet three feet from a 1,200-foot drop," said Miles Lechtman, an ex-Air America cargo specialist who is a friend and Carlsbad neighbor of Gamelin.

With congressional restrictions barring direct U.S. government or military aid, the sponsors of the secret operation apparently decided that the former Air America fliers represented the best available pool of talent--they were well-trained, trustworthy and tight-lipped. "If I were running this kind of operation and didn't have access to military personnel, they'd be the kind of people I would want," said William M. Leary, a professor of history at the University of Georgia who has studied CIA air operations in Southeast Asia.

The Minnesota-born Gamelin, 45, a former Green Beret who saw action in Vietnam, said he joined Air America in 1968, returning to the United States in 1973 with his Laotian wife. Back home, Gamelin took up welding and, in 1976, settled in California. He has two children, 12 and 14.

Like other Air America alumni, Gamelin acknowledges an occasional restlessness about his current, comparatively sedentary existence. He concedes a periodic desire for the travel, danger and friendship of the old days in Southeast Asia. The camaraderie of Air America veterans is legendary; the ex-fliers keep in close touch through annual reunions and other contacts.

"Maybe we were a little crazy," Gamelin says of himself and his Air America co-workers. "I think the people who do these kinds of things are by nature a little adventurous. I don't think that ever gets out of your system . . . Obviously, you don't find too many CPAs doing this kind of thing . . . We were willing to stick up and fight for what we believed in."

So when Bill Cooper called last June, Gamelin was ready. At Cooper's request, he says, he also telephoned Hasenfus at his home in Wisconsin. Hasenfus, out of work and experiencing financial problems, expressed interest in the $3,000 a month job, Gamelin said. The reunion in Miami last July quickly brought back old times.

"Gene had put on a little weight but he had that same old smile, that smile that made you feel good," Gamelin recalled. "When we run into our old (Air America) buddies, we seem to pick up where we left off."

The mens' motivations varied. For Hasenfus, an ex-Marine, the money was important.

"He needed a job pretty badly," Gamelin said. "I don't think I ever heard Gene say anything about politics. He is just a guy who has a lot of common sense and was good at his job . . . Gene wouldn't get into the books and read up on the situation as I would."

Personally, Gamelin says, he himself could have earned more as a welder. Instead, he says he was motivated by his dislike of Communism and his belief that the operation was morally correct--as well as his admitted desire for the under-fire camaraderie of the old days.

"I don't think anybody can understand the bond between people like us, because they've never worked in a situation like this . . . and you can't explain it. You just can't. It's just like trying to explain being on one of those planes. You can't."

Other Air America veterans were apparently approached and said they couldn't make it.

"I just didn't want to put my family through it," said Lechtman, who says he declined to participate in the operation.

Mercenaries, soldiers of fortune--these are phrases sometimes used to describe participants in the contra supply operation, but Gamelin and others insist that the stereotype is untrue. "These aren't the kind of people you see wearing their fatigues and 'I Hate the Commies' T-shirts at soldier-of-fortune conventions," noted Leary, the Georgia professor who has studied CIA air operations. "People like Dan Gamelin have seen action and, indeed, faced grave danger."

Asked how he felt about those who asserted that the contra supply operation was providing weapons to kill innocent Nicaraguan civilians, Gamelin responded that the Nicaraguan regime also used violence. "We felt like we were doing the right thing," he said.

Gamelin declined to provide many details about his stint in Central America, but he did say that much of the mission's time was spent ensuring that basic tasks, such as the loading of the aircraft, were performed correctly. He and Hasenfus shared a room in a San Salvador hotel, he said. Both worked shifts of about one month and then returned home for 10 days or so on breaks.

"I think everybody was a little disillusioned with the equipment that they had, but at the same time, we knew that Cooper was trying to do the best that he could . . . He probably did the work of four people . . . He was trying to do it all, being a pilot, loading equipment, trying to save money . . . He was really preoccupied . . . I think the last thing he ever thought was that he would be shot down."

Gamelin would not comment on any ground contacts in Central America, but he denied that the U.S. embassy provided any assistance. "I'm sure they (embassy officials) had access to a lot of information that would have helped us," he said.
After a break back home in Carlsbad, Gamelin said, he returned to San Salvador on Oct. 5th--arriving about one hour after the departure of the ill-fated cargo plane. "Actually,

Cooper called me up a few days before and said 'Get down here yesterday,' " Gamelin recalled, adding that he couldn't rearrange his return flight--luckily for him, as it turned out.
Although it was evident that something was wrong when the Oct. 5th mission didn't return, Gamelin says it was unclear whether the flight had been shot down until someone heard a report on the following day. "I think they heard it on Cuban radio," Gamelin said. "We heard a parachute was seen."

Soon, the bad news became known: Cooper, Sawyer and a Nicaragua crewman had been killed; Hasenfus was a prisoner. Gamelin said he spent the next few days attempting to clean out personal items from the hotel room and safe houses in El Salvador, making telephone calls to families back home, and dodging an increasingly curious press corps before he returned to California on Oct. 13. Complicating matters was the earthquake that struck San Salvador on Oct. 10.

"I hope something good comes out of all this," says Gamelin. "I'd just like to see old Eugene get out quick and get back to his family." He pauses, then adds: "Like I told 'Buzz' Sawyer once, 'Nobody ever said it would be easy.' "

[snowmman 3]

(edit) Don't think is the same Reed I posted the picture of as a kicker. First name is different. This Reed was in Task Force Alpha in Vietnam, not Air America.

here Reed describes Bill Cooper in 1984.

I've not read enough to decide if it's all bullshit yet, but seems to align.

http://books.google.com/books?id=zRlXGVfUJPsC&pg=PA118&lpg=PA118&dq=%22bill+cooper%22+air+america&source=bl&ots=L_4sWA5CB2&sig=127ckfBUM8jYULvJ3Szy9QflLMw&hl=en&ei=eFF3Sq2KO46uswOGiYXdBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2#v=onepage&q=%22bill%20cooper%22%20air%20america&f=false

(edit)
photo of Bill Cooper back in the day attached
1965-1970
Geographic Location: Vientiane, Laos
Description: Bill Cooper and Denny Thomas standing by a pickup truck.

[377 22]

Quote

So when Bill Cooper called last June, Gamelin was ready. At Cooper's request, he says, he also telephoned Hasenfus at his home in Wisconsin. Hasenfus, out of work and experiencing financial problems, expressed interest in the $3,000 a month job, Gamelin said. The reunion in Miami last July quickly brought back old times.

$3000 a month for that kind of work??? Sheeesh...talk about underpaid.

There is a lot of urban legend about the CIA being involved in drug trafficking to finance covert ops. Check out Vortex's DC 6 flights. I think most conspiracy stuff is BS and it is hard to imagine carreer govt service folks immersing themselves in such a tawdry business, but who knows? The CIA went FAR FAR over the ethics line in MK Ultra. Bruce, Snow, your thoughts on this drug stuff?

http://whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/MENA/dea_contradicts_north.html

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[snowmman 3]

it's interesting how people developed their contacts/resumes in Vietnam/Cambodia/Laos with SOG or Air America, and then that led to North/Nicaragua, and even Waugh going to Libya with Wilson, and then eventually Afghanistan.

It'll be interesting to see what the future brings for young guys who developed Iraq/Afghanistan connections now.

[377 22]

A bit overpriced but I am sure you could haggle:

http://www.controller.com/listings/detail.aspx?OHID=1123732

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[snowmman 3]

Quote

A bit overpriced but I am sure you could haggle:

http://www.controller.com/listings/detail.aspx?OHID=1123732

377

how hard would it be to set up an "Oliver North Special" operation for hire. ...buy the C-123K, hire a pilot and a bunch of jumpers. Can sell the C-123K afterwards.

Might be suspicious if I set up a little RV at Perris with a "Kickers Wanted" sign?

[snowmman 3]

Damn, just read the Neutrality Act
"23. Private citizens should not be permitted to mount expeditions from the United States against foreign governments without formal U.S. government approval in advance and prompt notice to law enforcement"

If we shoot an email to Larry Carr before we buy the C-123K, I suppose that's considered prompt notice, so maybe we're covered.

(edit) Good data on the North/drugs/contra issue (North's code name was "The Hammer")
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB113/

Here's a good historical document on the Drugs issue:

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB113/north06.pdf


Report from the Subcommitte on Terrorism, Narcotics and International Operations of the Committee on Foreign Relations, December 1988. (DEA)

Who was on this Committee?
Joe Biden
John Kerry
Dan Moynihan
Jesse Helms
...
90 pages (2 pages per pdf page)

pg 26 of 90
The North Notebooks are on page 145 (page 78 of 90 of the pdf)
2,848 pages of spiral bound notes taken by North on a daily basis from September 1984 through November 1986.
The drug related entries are listed on page 146 (79 of 90 of the pdf)

page 26 of 90
"Lotz said that Contra operations on the Southern Front were in fact funded by drug operations. He testified that weapons for the Contras came from Panama on small planes carrying mixed loads which included drugs. The pilots unloaded the weapons, refueled, and headed north toward the U.S. with drugs. The pilots included Americans, Panamanians, and Columbians, and occasionally, uniformed members of the Panamanian Defense Forces."
...
"Pilots who made combined Contra weapons/drug flights through the Southern Front included:....
-Gerardo Duran, a Costa Rican pilot..
-Gary Wayne Betzner, drug pilot who worked for convicted smuggler George Morales...
-Jose "Chepon" Robelo, the head of UDN-FARN air force on the Southern Front...

The State Department selected four companies owned and operated by narcotics traffickers to supply humanitarian assistance to the Contras. The companies were:

SETCO Air...
DIACSA...
Frigorificos de Puntaremas...
Vortex ...Michael Palmer
"

[377 22]

Quote

Might be suspicious if I set up a little RV at Perris with a "Kickers Wanted" sign?

No prob Snow, but you might get more screamers than kickers at a DZ.

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[377 22]

Drug smuggling, hiring hookers, covert LSD dosing of innocent subjects, sending TOW missiles to our enemies...

Tell me again, how do I distinguish the government guys from the bad guys?

I can see where a straight arrow SF guy figures out that he has been risking his life for the benefit of lawless thugs in DC and decides that he is going to play by a new set of rules. He scopes out flights, jumpable airliners, overflown LZs, seasonal weather and hatches a fantastic plan.

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[377 22]

Quote

Damn, just read the Neutrality Act
"23. Private citizens should not be permitted to mount expeditions from the United States against foreign governments without formal U.S. government approval in advance and prompt notice to law enforcement"

If we shoot an email to Larry Carr before we buy the C-123K, I suppose that's considered prompt notice, so maybe we're covered.

Funny wording for such an important law: "SHOULD not be permitted..."

377

2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

[snowmman 3]

Quote

Drug smuggling, hiring hookers, covert LSD dosing of innocent subjects, sending TOW missiles to our enemies...

Tell me again, how do I distinguish the government guys from the bad guys?

I can see where a straight arrow SF guy figures out that he has been risking his life for the benefit of lawless thugs in DC and decides that he is going to play by a new set of rules. He scopes out flights, jumpable airliners, overflown LZs, seasonal weather and hatches a fantastic plan.

377

That site has a bunch of FOIA docs that are great. They do a great job organizing them.

For instance: back when Colby was filling Ford in on the Schlessiner CIA "family jewels" report of illegal stuff, in 1975, and what they were going to do..here's the memo of conversation in the Oval Office, Colby briefing Ford.

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/family_jewels_wh1.pdf

There's a number of other memos in subsequent days. Kissinger throws a fit, when they're brainstorming about what other bad shit will come out. Like that Bobby Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro. Or the NSA wiretapping domestically. (sure! even back then!). They worry about the FBI getting a "hunting license" on the CIA. Kissinger frets it could be "worse than Watergate". Says what Colby has done is a disgrace. Ford asks whether Colby should be suspended.
Kissinger says Helms says this is just the tip of the iceberg. Ford agrees Helms is a good guy and will keep his mouth shut. "I know Dick Helms and think very highly of him"
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/family_jewels_wh2.pdf

I love this exchange from:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/family_jewels_wh3.pdf

Secretary Schlesinger: Legally NSA is spotless.
Secretary Kissinger: If they are only looking at illegal activities.


WTF? what does that mean. We have Cabinet Secretaries saying bullshit?

They talk about the FBI having it's own bad stuff, that can dribble out to confuse the CIA issue.

full overview at
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/

(edit) background on that site:
" About the National Security Archive

An independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University, the Archive collects and publishes declassified documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The Archive also serves as a repository of government records on a wide range of topics pertaining to the national security, foreign, intelligence, and economic policies of the United States. The Archive won the 1999 George Polk Award, one of U.S. journalism's most prestigious prizes, for--in the words of the citation--"piercing the self-serving veils of government secrecy, guiding journalists in the search for the truth and informing us all.""

[snowmman 3]

RULE 1: "Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have."

RULE 2: "Never go outside the expertise of your people."

RULE 3: "Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy."

RULE 4: "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules."

RULE 5: "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon."

RULE 6: "A good tactic is one your people enjoy."

RULE 7: "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag."

RULE 8: "Keep the pressure on. Never let up."

RULE 9: "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself."

RULE 10: "If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive."

RULE 11: "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."

RULE 12: "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it."

"From all our legends, mythology, and history (and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins – or which is which), the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom – Lucifer."

[skyjack71 0]

Sounds like you guys are putting a bunch of "stuff" together for an action film. Drugs and war and warriors. You all must have a lot of time on your hands to do all of this - by the way when do you work or is this work?

there was rising water because of a recent snow Melt in the early part of 1980 - Fazio mentioned the snow melt - unusual to have one at that time of the year. This rising water a few days or a couple of wks before the money was found was also mentioned by the Local firshermen - in a book and in news articles.

I don't feel like digging for the information - but, I am usually right about these things. I have read and heard with my own ears - these statements made by others involved in the 1980 find. Fazio pointed out where the water came up to with that RISE in water - there was NO mention of a tide...but I left the group on the beach and went off by myself. I was upset about not seeing the places Duane took me to in 1979 and I was not going to PRETEND this was the spot. Fazio and Himmelsbach I am sure will back me up on that.

So much has happened - and something ODD is going on. I do not know what has triggered certain interest in Cooper as I do not discuss it with anyone in the vicinity. I was asked about "Hooper" by a woman who I happened chance to be talking to - bear in mind I didn't even know the woman's name....and I don't talk about this in my home community.

She evidently has done some jumping of her own - probably prior military, because I didn't ask questions (typical Jo - in any social situation). She said she had jumped from similar planes and it wasn't difficult at all. She just volunteered that information for some reason. I didn't ask but I am sure it would not have been the same kind of chute Cooper used.

We have and are acquiring more pictures for the night clerk to view - to see if there is something about the night in Portland buried in his memory.
Since the FBI will not do this we are acquiring other pictures of men and WOMEN taken during that time frame...he will not know what we are looking for. Because of a couple of things he has said over the yrs - he had a feeling Collins was NOT alone.

If any of you have pictures of yourself or a family member taken around 1971 and approx 45 at that time we could sure use it. You can send it to me in a PM so it doesn't end up on the site. The picture Snowmman posted of the two guys behind the pick up is a good picture to use - if you will give us permission to use it. One of the men FIT the decription and had the look we are searching for. I have no problem scambling the other persons head...as I have done this with pictures of Duane and exwife.

I am having a problem finding pics with the look and the time frame. Any help I can get with the project will be appreciated.
They need to be in street clothes and not military.

I am doing this and freeing up time for others to do what they do best....digging away - finding more and more and more. It is a dirty rotten shame that a woman (housewife), writers, forum members, PI's, others just wanting to help are actually investigating the crime and talking to "witnesses".

This comes 37 yrs too late for much of it to be conclusive in the eyes of the authorities...and the FBI had most of this information since 1996...yet they didn't look at it until 1997 and then they didn't really investigate or Ralph Hope would never have said the things he did to me in early 2000. His own words - PROVE that the FBI did not do the investigation they claimed to have done in a letter to me dated in 1998.

I do keep good records because it was a habit of mine. Thank heavens I did - because this morning - I poured myself 3 cups of coffee...and would pick up one I had pour earlier and wonder why it was cold....and ier every day I live.

The FBI was NEVER interested in revealing anything on the Collins background from 1962 till 1968 - wonder why? Duane could not draw SS on that time period. Ever wonder why the FBI did not send me the Jefferson Records - SS records? Proving John Collins and Duane L. Weber where the same person would have given me access to something NO one wanted me to find.????

Satchel, sack, ankle rubbers and a battery. That battery had a dual purpose...and so did the flares...

Flash Back 1969 - The Bourbon New Orleans and The shoe shine man who worked the Quarters. Then in 1969 and 1970 - N.C. and S.C. Fast Track - no income - living high and they have 2 children with them. Quick exit to Georgia - and bounces back and forth from Georgia to the Carolinas and Arkansas. AK is interesting....the FBI wasn't even aware I knew about AK or they missed it.

The Past was a beacon light.... or....maybe just a past..

Copyright 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 2013, 2014, 2015 by Jo Weber

[skyjack71 0]

Edited to save space.

Quote

There's a number of other memos in subsequent days. Kissinger throws a fit, when they're brainstorming about what other bad shit will come out. Like that Bobby Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of Castro

.

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Ford asks whether Colby should be suspended.
Kissinger says Helms says this is just the tip of the iceberg. Ford agrees Helms is a good guy and will keep his mouth shut. "I know Dick Helms and think very highly of him"

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They talk about the FBI having it's own bad stuff, that can dribble out to confuse the CIA issue.

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The Archive won the 1999 George Polk Award, one of U.S. journalism's most prestigious prizes, for--in the words of the citation--"piercing the self-serving veils of government secrecy, guiding journalists in the search for the truth and informing us all.""

I just love the post you just did - you are hired.

Kennedy actually managed the Cuban attempt ? Is that why Duane was so fond of Bobby and why he claimed to have a tie that belonged to him (taken in the early part of 1968 from a large round hotel in Jefferson...just wks after he was released from the Federal prison and prior to MLK being assasinated.

Helms? He has come up so much in my searching over the yrs - and they were right...he did keep his mouth shut about lots of things.

"Piercing the self-serving veils of government secrecy, guiding journalists in the search for the truth and informing us all"

Aprroximately 20 words that puts the entire era in a nutshell.

Copyright 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 2013, 2014, 2015 by Jo Weber

[snowmman 3]

AK is where all AK-47's are grown, right?

No, it's Arkansas.

Weird coincidence: Ingram is in/was in Mena, Arkansas.
During the Oliver North thing, Mena, Arkansas was mentioned because of the drug smuggling allegations.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Drugs,-CIA,-And-USA---Mena,-Arkansas-Coverup&id=513418

not sure about the truth of all the allegations but:

"1101 Mena St. is the local to the secret history of our life and times as a nation trafficking in drugs and arms. It is a small obscure town in western Arkansas, with a population around 5,000 people. With no tower and monitoring of flights, Barry Seal found Mena to be the perfect place to fly in and out without being recorded. Barry brought up to $5 billion of cocaine into the USA during the 1980s. Mena was where he based his cargo airline and parked his one of three C123 planes that made trips to Colombia and Nicaragua."

(edit) Operation Black Eagle and Mena detailed here: (Penthouse, I read it for the articles)
http://www.serendipity.li/cia/c_o_mena.html

[snowmman 3]

re: "permission" on photos.

Obviously I've taken none of the pictures. But they are all real and of the time and place I stated.

I have no idea about any "permission" issues. In most cases I've posted the links that were the source of the photos. The extensive Air America airdrop related photos were from an amazing collection by Dan Gamelin. Dan was clearly there, and I posted the Hasenfaus article as an example that had Gamelin talking about back in the day.

Here's the Dan Gamelin photo source (there are 4 Air America albums. the rest are reunions). I think he posted the key '68-'73 photos in 2008? Very nice quality both on the photos, and the scan for posting. Nice job Dan.

I have no idea why he posted his photos to a common photo sharing website. Maybe he wanted to share them with the community?
http://community.webshots.com/user/dangamelin

How come jumper women are talking to Jo? 377 may be correct, my RV needs a better sign: "KickersScreamers Wanted"

(edit) The photo of Bill Cooper and Denny Thomas was from
http://lib.treasures.utdallas.edu/handle/2152.1/92

(edit) 377: what's the weird joystick/antenna gizmo Denny Thomas is holding in his hands???

It's interesting the range of people that were involved with the Air America thing. Take ordinary people, give them fun technology, a budget, a sense of mission, and "rightness" of cause, and they'll do most anything. Especially if it's on foreign soil where the "other" people don't speak English.

[snowmman 3]

"According to still other Seal records, at least some of the aircraft in his smuggling fleet, which included a Lear jet, helicopters, and former U.S. military transports, were also outfitted with avionics and other equipment by yet another company in turn linked to Air America.

Among the aircraft flown in and out of Mena was Seal's C-123K cargo plane, christened Fat Lady. The records show that Fat Lady, serial number 54-0679, was sold by Seal months before his death. According to other files, the plane soon found its way to a phantom company of what became known in the Iran-Contra scandal as "the Enterprise," the C.I.A.-related secret entity managed by Oliver North and others to smuggle illegal weapons to the Nicaraguan Contra rebels. According to former D.E.A. agent Celerino Castillo and others, the aircraft was allegedly involved in a return traffic in cocaine, profits from which were then used to finance more clandestine gunrunning.
...
A former member of the Army Special Forces, Seal had ties to the Central Intelligence Agency dating to the early 1970s. He had confided to relatives and others, according to their sworn statements, that he was a C.I.A. operative before and during the period when he established his operations at Mena. In one statement to Louisiana State Police, a Seal relative said, "Barry was into gunrunning and drug smuggling in Central and South America ... and he had done some time in El Salvadore [sic]." Another then added, "lt was true, but at the time Barry was working for the C.I.A."
...

Seal's personal videotapes, in the authors' possession, show one scene in which he used U.S. Army paratroop equipment, as well as militarylike precision, in his drug-transporting operation. Then, in the middle of the afternoon after a number of dry runs, one of his airplanes dropped a load of several duffel bags attached to a parachute. Within seconds, the cargo sitting on the remote grass landing strip was retrieved by Seal and loaded onto a helicopter that had followed the low-flying aircraft. "This is the first daylight cocaine drop in the history of the state of Louisiana," Seal narrates on the tape. If the duffel bags seen in the smuggler's home movies were filled with cocaine — as Seal himself states on tape — that single load would have been worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Perhaps the videos were not of an actual cocaine drop, but merely the drug trafficker's training video for his smuggling organization, or even a test maneuver. Regardless, the films show a remarkable, fearless invincibility. Barry Seal was not expecting apprehension.

..
Officials repeatedly invoked national security to quash most of the investigations. Court documents do show clearly that the C.I.A. and the D.E.A. employed Seal during 1984 and 1985 for the Reagan administration's celebrated sting attempt to implicate the Nicaraguan Sandinista regime in cocaine trafficking.

According to a December 1988 Senate Foreign Relations Committee report, "cases were dropped. The apparent reason was that the prosecution might have revealed national-security information, even though all of the crimes which were the focus of the investigation occurred before Seal became a federal informant."

Tax records show that, having assessed Seal posthumously for some $86 million in back taxes on his earnings from Mena and elsewhere between 1981 and 1983, even the I.R.S. forgave the taxes on hundreds of millions in known drug and gun profits over the ensuing two-year period when Seal was officially admitted to be employed by the government."