This is a photo of the Mount Mitchell Pacemaker, operated by Piedmont Airlines. Photo taken sometime in the early 80's. Piedmont named all their airplanes Pacemakers, after a particular region they served. The Outer Banks Pacemaker, the Great Lakes Pacemaker, the Tennessee Valley Pacemaker, etc . . .

Piedmont operated this aircraft from 1978 to 1984, and registered it as N838N. They bought it from Northwest Airlines who took delivery from Boeing in 1965 as N467US. This is the same aircraft that D.B. Cooper jumped from on his famous flight.

A vain airfoil was devised by Boeing shortly after his famous jump, and became known as a "Cooper-Lock" that prevented the rear stair on a 727 from opening in flight.

I started working for Piedmont in 1982, and every time the airplane would pull into one of our gates, I just had to walk up & down the rear stairs and wonder. Although the aircraft was named the Mount Mitchell Pacemaker, all the employees of Piedmont affectionately called it the D.B. Cooper Pacemaker.

The aircraft was sold to Key Air who ceased operations in 1993, and the aircraft was broken up for scrap metal shortly thereafter in Greenwood, MS.

DB COOPER = CROS !

Interesting article from a few years back, it's possible that a private investigator actually figured out who D.B. Cooper was. If he's right, the man immortalized as "D.B. Cooper" died of cancer in 1994.

http://nymag.com/news/features/39593/ 

That story sounds better than anything I've heard, thanks for posting.

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It seems real odd he'd hijack an airline he worked for. In the early 70's, male "stewards" & pursers were a rarity. I'm really surprised no one recognized him. Male flight attendants back then stuck out like a sore thumb, mainly because everyone considered them phags.