FBI revives mystery of skydiving hijacker

New York: One of the most perplexing crimes of American history - in which an unassuming airline passenger hijacked a plane in 1971 and skydived out of the aircraft with $200,000 (Dh734,580) in ransom money - has been revived by the FBI.

The bureau has, for the first time, released pictures and information from the case on its website in the hope of resolving the identity and the fate of the parachuting passenger known as Dan Cooper.

On November 24, 1971, a man in his mid-40s bought a ticket in the name of D.B. Cooper for a Northwest Orient flight from Portland to Seattle. After take-off, he handed a flight attendant a note saying he had a bomb in his suitcase. In Seattle, he exchanged all 36 passengers for the ransom money and four parachutes, but kept several crew members on board as he ordered the plane to take off for Mexico City.

Over a rural part of Washington state, "Cooper" jumped from the plane with a parachute. Dead or alive, he has never been seen since.

The DB Cooper mystery has led to decades of speculation.