Hopper: The Facts

Summary. On January 10, 1968, an F-4 piloted by USAF CAPT Keith Hall (aircraft commander), with LT Earl Hopper, Jr. as backseater
( bombardier / navigator ), was shot down over North Vietnam. Hall told Hopper to eject. Hopper replied over the intercom that he had tried to eject and his ejection system was not working. Hall again told Hopper to eject. Hopper told Hall to go ahead, that his system was not working. Hall ejected, was captured, and returned at Operation Homecoming. Hopper was not able to eject and rode the aircraft into the ground.

Hopper's father, Retired US Army Colonel Earl Hopper, for years has spread an almost completely false story about his son's loss. This article contains:

UPDATE:
5 May 2002.
LT Earl Hopper's remains were identified and the identification was
approved by the Secretary of the Air Force on 16 January 2002.

How to read this article

At the risk of confusing everyone, I have reproduced the phony story below, then, I have repeated the phony story with facts inserted. Here goes.

This is the phony story, unedited, exactly as it appears on a prominent MIA misinformation website.

Source: Compiled by Homecoming II Project 01 October 1990 from information provided by Col. Earl P. Hopper, Sr. (USA, ret.) and Patty Skelly of Task Force Omega, Inc.
Other information from one more of the following: raw data from U.S. Government agency sources, published sources, interviews.

SYNOPSIS: Capt. Keith N. Hall and 1Lt. Earl P. Hopper, Jr. were pilots assigned to the 13th Tactical Fighter Squadron based at Udorn Airbase, Thailand. On January 10, 1968 the two flew their first mission together on an "aircap" mission over Hanoi. Hall was the pilot, and Hopper flew as Bombardier/Navigator on the flight. During the mission, the aircraft was damaged by a SAM missile exploding 100 feet below and to the right of the aircraft, knocking out the hydraulic system. Neither Hall nor Hopper was injured by the blast.

After some initial ejection problems, Capt. Hall, was able to bail out. [Note: Normal ejection sequence calls for the backseater to bail out first, followed a few seconds later by the pilot.] Other pilots in the flight marked Hall's position, then continued with Hopper as he headed for Laos.

Hopper was about 15 miles north of Muong Min in Hoa Binh Province and nearly to the border of Laos when he ejected. Hall had ejected about 20 miles to the east.

The accompanying pilots observed the canopy of the aircraft and Hopper's ejection seat leave the aircraft as the aircraft was about to enter a 5,000 foot overcast. The pilots also picked up two emergency radio signals, one very strong and the other rather weak, indicating that both men reached the ground.

Hall was closely interrogated regarding personal information about Hopper, but knew little. The Vietnamese guard was noncommittal when Hall asked if Hopper was also a prisoner.

During the first few months of 1984, the Hopper family learned that CIA had always listed Hopper as a POW. Further, CIA files revealed that the agency had tracked Hopper as he headed for a "safe" area in Laos, that there were heavy concentrations of NVA and Pathet Lao troops in the area searching for the downed pilot, and that the CIA sent a free Lao team to extract him. When Hopper knew he was in imminent danger of being captured, he locked the transmission key on his radio in the "on" position, extended the antenna, and hid it, thus marking his location of capture for the search team.

In 1984, Maj. Smith received word that on 11 May three U.S. POWs would be brought to a given location on the Lao/Thai border. The only prerequisite was that the POWs be received by an American. Smith's request to stand on the border and wait for delivery was refused, and he and his team were commanded to remain in Korea. If the three Americans were brought to the border, no one was there to receive them. Smith and McIntyre believed Hopper to be one of the three men.

Parents Earl and Betty Hopper have diligently sought information on their son and others who disappeared in Southeast Asia. They believe there is actionable evidence that some are still alive in captivity. Until that evidence is acted upon, and proof is obtained to the contrary, they will not give up hope that their son is alive.

1Lt. Earl Hopper graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1965 and was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel during the period he was maintained missing.

Now, for the facts. The following is the phony story with facts inserted. This is what you are about to read:

Name: Earl Pearson Hopper, Jr
Rank/Branch: O2/US Air Force
Unit: 13th Tactical Fighter Squadron,
Udorn AB TH
Date of Birth: 21 July 1943
Home City of Record: Glendale AZ
Date of Loss: 10 January 1968
Country of Loss: North Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 202559N
1044659E (VH774777)
Status (in 1973): Missing In Action (FACT: Status is Presumptive Finding of Death)
Category: 2 (FACT: In preparation for Operation Homecoming, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the military services attempted to determine just who would be coming home and what were the chances that the Vietnamese would know about men who did not come home. For example, the Vietnamese could not be expected to have any information about a man lost fifty miles at sea. On the other hand, if a man were lost when his aircraft was shot down into an area where there was a heavy concentration of North Vietnamese forces, it is quite likely that they would know something about him. Men were categorized into Categories 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. Category 1 was "confirmed enemy knowledge." Category 2 is "suspect enemy knowledge." Category 3, "doubtful enemy knowledge;" Category 4, "unknown knowledge;" Category 5, "remains unrecoverable." Click here to read the facts about the categories. These categories are regularly misrepresented by the MIA activists. They proclaim that Category 1 means "confirmed POW,' Category 2 is "probable POW," etc. Not so.)
Acft/Vehicle/Ground: F4D

After some initial ejection problems, Capt. Hall, was able to bail out. (FACT: The primary ejection method in the F-4 is a small handle at the base of the seat, centered between the crewman's legs. That is the desired method to eject because it places the hands and arms securely together in the middle of the body and allows one to lean back and place the head against the back of the seat. The secondary ejection method involves reaching up and grabbing a ring which is near and slightly behind the ear area. That ring is hard to reach in the
back seat, and harder if the person is tall. The following information was reported by CAPT Hall after he was repatriated at Operation Homecoming, 1973. Hall told Hopper to eject but got no reply. Hall again told Hopper to eject, saying: "Earl, get out." Hopper replied: "I've pulled it and it won't go." This meant that he had pulled the ejection handle and he did not eject. Hall again told Hopper to eject and Hopper replied "You go." At that point, Hall pulled his primary ejection handle -- it failed -- he pulled the secondary ring and was ejected.) [Note: Normal ejection sequence calls for the backseater to bail out first, followed a few seconds later by the pilot.] (FACT: The F-4 has two possible ejection sequences: LOCKED and UNLOCKED. When the system is UNLOCKED, each individual pulls his own ejection handle. When it is LOCKED, when one guy pulls his handle, an ejection sequence is started that ejects first the backseater then the front seater.) Other pilots in the flight marked Hall's position, then continued with Hopper as he headed for Laos. (Fact: This is completely false. The other flight members observed the aircraft break into three pieces as soon as Hall ejected.)

Hopper was about 15 miles north of Muong Min in Hoa Binh Province and nearly to the border of Laos when he ejected. (Fact: Hopper never ejected. Read on.) Hall had ejected about 20 miles to the east.

The accompanying pilots observed the canopy of the aircraft and Hopper's ejection seat leave the aircraft as the aircraft was about to enter a 5,000 foot overcast.(FACT: Hopper was not able to eject from the aircraft. Other members of the flight had the aircraft in sight and saw it break into three large pieces. They reported different observations regarding the ejection: the flight leader believed he saw a dark shape leave the aircraft followed by a similar object but he saw no parachute; a second flight member said he saw two objects leave at the same time but did not see a parachute; a third flight member saw neither canopy nor seat leave the aircraft; a fourth saw two spots behind the aircraft, and, a fifth saw two canopies but only one seat leave the aircraft.) The pilots also picked up two emergency radio signals, one very strong and the other rather weak, indicating that both men reached the ground. (FACT: Other aircraft in the flight picked up one strong beeper signal -- Hall's. Hall established voice contact with the flight leader and the search and rescue aircraft in the area. The flight leader and SAR aircraft made 10 to 12 calls for Hopper, none of which were answered. Another aircraft, several miles away, reported hearing a weak, intermittent beeper. Because of the distance involved, and the terrain over which the beeper's UHF signal had to pass, it is probable that what the distant aircraft heard was Hall's beeper.)

Hall was captured about 40 minutes after he bailed out. Hopper's radio signal was tracked for three consecutive days in the rugged, mountainous area where the aircraft went down. On the second or third day, a pilot monitoring the beeper gave Hopper's recognition code and said, "Lt. Hopper, if that's you, give me 15-second intervals (in his radio signal)." The pilot received six 15-second intervals in a positive response. This information was released to the family in a February 8, 1968 communique. On about the third day, a ground search team was inserted into the area, and recovered Hopper's radio, but no trace of Hopper was found. (FACT: This part of the story is completely false. There was no tracking of Hopper's radio signal anywhere because there was no radio signal to track. Hall landed on the ground and immediately established radio contact with his flight leader and search and rescue aircraft. Flight leader and SAR tried to raise Hopper on the radio and never received a reply. )

Hall was closely interrogated regarding personal information about Hopper, but knew little. The Vietnamese guard was noncommittal when Hall asked if Hopper was also a prisoner. (FACT: Hall was questioned only briefly about Hopper. It was not unusual for the Vietnamese to ask a captured man the identity of other members of his crew. Hall reported that he asked his Vietnamese interrogator about Hopper and the interrogator replied that he did not know anything about Hopper.)

On July 14, 1982, "due to the length of time missing and with no information to prove he is alive," Hopper's official status, Missing In Action, was changed to Presumed Killed In Action. Only two months later, a three-man judiciary committee from the U.S. Justice Department, Foreign Claims Settlement Commission, found officially that Hopper should have been classified Prisoner of War, not Missing In Action. (FACT: There is an old US law that states that if a US citizen is detained illegally by a foreign power, that citizen is due a monetary award from the US government for the time that he was detained. Earl Hopper, Sr., sued the US government under this law. The court, ruling that they had no real way of determining Hopper's fate, awarded Earl Hopper a sum of money covering the period of time from the date of his son's loss to the date that the last POW returned at Homecoming. Hopper, Sr., has regularly misrepresented this ruling as somehow proving that the US government knew his son was alive.)

From 1981 to 1984, Major Mark A. Smith (a returned POW from Vietnam) and SFC Melvin McIntyre, both attached to Special Forces Detachment, Korea (SFDK) were pursuing DIA instructions to gather intelligence on American POWs who remained in captivity in Southeast Asia. (FACT: Smith and McIntyre were not operating under DIA authority or any other authority for that matter. As members of the Special Forces Detachment in Korea, they traveled to Thailand from time to time on training missions. While there, Smith picked up some of the stories told by scam artists and frauds that circulated around the refugee camps. Click here to read Wick Tourison's excellent article on fraudulent and misleading reporting. It was this sort of reporting that Smith picked up in Thailand. He reported these stories to Army intelligence. None of his information was of any value. Everything that Smith had was old, phony stories that DIA had heard time and again.) Smith and McIntyre, who did not believe Americans were held, obtained specific information which convinced them that Americans were still alive at that time, held captive. (FACT: After avoiding contact with DIA for several years, McIntyre was interviewed by DIA. During that interview, McIntyre stated that the information they had was "nothing substantive.") Among other evidence presented to the U.S. was a list of some 26 Americans by name and captivity location. Earl Hopper's name was on the list. (FACT: Smith has regularly produced lists of names of missing men, claiming that he has information about these men. Major Mark Smith, US Army (Retired) has never produced a single piece of useful information about any missing American. Here is an article about Smith.)

The information obtained by Smith and McIntyre was provided under oath to the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee on January 28, 1986, and included in a lawsuit the two initiated against the U.S. Government for its failure to protect the rights of live American POWs in Southeast Asia. (FACT: The Chairman of the Committee, Senator Frank Murkowski, and other members of the committee, reviewed the "evidence" presented by Smith and McIntyre and pronounced it "pretty lightweight stuff." Among the "evidence" were three photographs that Smith claimed showed American POWs still being held in SEAsia. The photos showed two men, dressed in jeans and casual shirts, wearing sunglasses, standing on the bank of a river, holding rifles and pistols. If these men were POWs, their captors had done a rather poor job of disarming them.)

1Lt. Earl Hopper graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1965 and was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel during the period he was maintained missing. (FACT: Promotion while in a missing status is normal. An individual is promoted, while missing, along with his contemporaries. Upon the issuance of a presumptive finding of death, the individual is promoted one more grade (except that no one will be promoted beyond 0-6, to general officer). This is done to ensure that the missing man's family receives the largest possible death settlement -- such settlements are based on salary.)

So, there you have the story. It is the same story that is told by LT Hopper's father from stages and podiums wherever he can get an audience. The bold green type contains the facts of the case. LT Earl Hopper died in his crash. He rode the aircraft in, unable to eject. There was no second beeper, no tracking of his radio, no clicks on the survival radio, no CIA tracking of Hopper, no radio locked in the transmit position, and there were not three men to be released.

Earl Hopper, Sr.

Note that the phony article carried on MIA "activist" sites talks about "Parents Earl and Betty Hopper." There is more to it than that. For many years, Earl Hopper, Sr. openly carried on an affair with a woman named Patty Skelly. Hopper and Skelly are the sole members of an organization they call Task Force Omega -- TFO consists of Skelly, Hopper, and an Internet connection, though they would have you believe that they are legion. Hopper and Skelly met in the mid-1980s and soon were an item among MIA families -- basically, old Earl was using MIA family activities as an excuse to bonk Patty -- all the while his wife, Earl, Jr.'s mother, Betty -- was fully aware of this but was powerless to do anything about it. While I was assigned to the DIA POW-MIA Office, I spoke at many family member meetings, some of them attended by Hopper, Skelly, and Betty Hopper. After-hours at these meetings, some of the family members would talk to me informally and many of them were upset with the way Hopper and Skelly were making no attempt to hide their affair and with the way Hopper was treating Betty. Betty Hopper developed Alzheimer's and died in 1998 or 1999 -- I forget which -- and Hopper and Skelly are now married.

Hopper claims to have extensive experience in Army intelligence. This is typical of his lies and misrepresentations. In his last job in the Army, Hopper was assigned as Director of Intelligence and Security at a small Army base -- this is a typical retirement assignment because it requires no real activity, leaving the incumbent free to concentrate on retiring. Such positions have no real intelligence duties -- but Hopper would have you believe that he was a colleague of Agent 007. In his dreams. One DIA admiral, a man with long experience in the intelligence field, and a man who had considerable dealings with Hopper, gave me this assessment of Earl Hopper, Sr: "He couldn't pour piss out of a boot with the instructions written on the sole."

Now I understand from a couple of folks who have received e-mail from her that Patty Skelly -- who did not meet Earl, Sr. until fifteen years AFTER Earl, Jr. was lost -- is sending e-mail signing herself as Earl, Jr.'s "stepmother." And I'm the King of England.

Closer examination

The Two-Man Crew

Hall and Hopper were the two crewmembers of an F-4. In the F-4, one guy sits in the front seat, the other is behind and slightly above in the back seat. There is a REAL difference in who these people are and what they do.

The guy in the front seat is the PILOT and the AIRCRAFT COMMANDER. He is a "rated" pilot -- that means his job, his training, and his sole duty is flying the aircraft. As the Aircraft Commander, he tells the other guy what to do and when to do it. And, at supersonic speeds, there is no debate. Air crews are drilled in doing what the aircraft commander says, when he says it.

The guy in the back is NOT NECESSARILY A RATED PILOT. Note that the inaccurate version of this incident tries to confuse this matter. In the opening paragraph, the bogus version of the incident says that Hall and Hopper were "both pilots assigned to the 13th Tactical Fighter Squadron." Later, Hopper is identified as the "bombardier/navigator." This is an important difference; to understand this difference, we need to review how the Air Force came to fly the F4.

The F4 was originally a Navy fighter. Navy airwar practice involves two-seater fighter aircraft: a pilot in the front and a weapons officer -- not a pilot -- in the back seat. The Air Force traditionally used single-seat fighter aircraft. In the Navy airwar model, the weapons officer operates the systems that acquire and fire on targets; he also had other duties to assist the pilot and, as the AF brought the F-4 into inventory, AF F-4 back-seaters picked up these duties:

Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara decided that the Air Force should adopt the F4 as an economy and efficiency move, reasoning that a single fighter could be used by both services. As a result, the Air Force had to hurriedly adopt the Navy model and train Weapons Systems Officers (WSO's, called "wizzos"). Candidate WSO's were taken after graduation from USAF navigator training and given graduate training in operating the weapons systems in the back seat of the F4. Their principal duties involved acquiring air-to-air targets by radar and aiding in the launch of missiles to shoot down other aircraft. They had little role in air-to-ground missions such as the one that Hall and Hopper were on when they were shot down.

In the early years of the war -- 1964 - 1966 -- there was a shortage of people to train as WSO's, thus, some rated pilots wound up flying in the back seat of the F4. The Air Force did not want to continue this practice because the time and expense to train a pilot was wasted if the guy flew in the back seat, not to mention the fact that two pilots were lost if the aircraft was shot down. By the time Hopper arrived in 1968, there were sufficient WSO candidates so that rated pilots were not flying in the back seat.

Ejection issues

The fact that Hall got out of the aircraft and Hooper did not is not unusual. I do not know how many two-seater aircraft were shot down and only one crewmember got out, but, I know personally of four such incidents.

The latest version of this incident

Earl Hopper, Sr. can't make up his mind which story he wants to tell about his son's loss. The story quoted above was snipped from one of the major MIA websites. However, you find a different story if you visit the "Task Force Omega" site, maintained by Earl Hopper, Sr., at this URL http://www.taskforceomegainc.org/H064.htm . Here are some of the incorrect statements on the TFO site.

5,000 feet

Now, let's do a little math and consider the physics of flight. This incident took place around 5,000 feet altitude. A fighter plane at 5,000 feet with flames coming out the back is serious trouble. It is likely to explode in the air. If the flight leader or anyone else in the flight sees it and says, "Get out," you get out IMMEDIATELY, which is exactly what Hall did. Remember, Hall tried his primary ejection system and it did not work so he pulled his backup. Hopper reported to Hall that he had "pulled it and it did not work." Hopper's ejection systems were not working.

At a conservative ground speed estimate of 250mph (they were likely flying much faster), the plane travels 4.16 miles in one minute -- and at 5,000 feet they were less than one mile above ground. Thus, at 5,000 feet, and the plane in trouble, the crew has about 10 seconds to execute a successful ejection. The plane most likely hit the ground in less than 15 seconds after Hall ejected.

What's Missing?

If you go to the Task Force Omega site or to any other site that posts the phony story about Hopper's loss, you will notice that one important bit of information is missing. What's missing? The results of the excavations of Earl Hopper, Jr.'s crash site are nowhere to be found. That's right, the crash site was located and searched eight times between November 1993 and November 1998. Why does Hopper, Sr. not want anyone to know the results of the excavations of the crash site? Read on for the answer.

Update: November 2000

The Hopper crashsite was surveyed and excavated several times. As a result, human bone fragments and teeth were recovered along with a substantial quantity of crew-related items, proving that Earl Hopper, Jr. was in the aircraft when it crashed. I submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for the documents that reported the results of the excavation(s) of the Hopper crash site and received those documents in December 1999. I did not post any of those documents on the Internet for some time but now it's time that the rest of the world reads the facts.

Crash site is investigated and excavated

The Hopper crash site was surveyed and excavated several times. The first action is to find the site and survey it -- make certain that this really is a US aircraft crash site, determine what will be needed in the way of equipment and people to excavate the site, and, if possible, recover pieces of wreckage that will identify the crash site. Here is a chart showing the surveys and excavations of the Hopper crash site.

Date	Activity	Results
11 November 1993	Surveyed suspected crash site, interviewed witnesses	Concluded that crash site generally correlates to Hopper's loss
4-5 March 1994	Surveyed site, interviewed witnesses	Recommended site be placed in "pending excavation" category
19 October 1995	Conducted surface search of crash site	Found pieces of wreckage containing serial numbers that correlated to Hopper's aircraft
6 - 23 January 1997	Excavation	Found four possible bone fragments and numerous pieces of life support equipment ( Follow-on analysis showed the possible bone fragments were not bone (3 fragments) or were not human (1 fragment) )
12 March - 12 April 1997	Excavation	Found human teeth and bone fragments, personal effects, and material evidence
9 - 30 November 1997	Excavation	Found human teeth and bone fragments
24 February - 14 March 1998	Excavation	Found human bone fragments
9 - 22 November 1998	Excavation (final)	Found personal effects and material evidence

The Findings

Note that the chart above indicates that human remains, life support equipment, and material evidence were recovered. Let's examine what that means. Crew-related equipment found in crash sites are critical to determining the fate of the crew. Here is the process:

The following is a list of items recovered during the excavations of Hopper's crashsite. I have consolidated this list from several messages that I received as a result of my FOIA request. Following the last excavation, the Joint Task Force -- Full Accounting (the people who do the excavations) issued a message that consolidated all items found in the crashsite. I have reproduced that list in the chart below and I have scanned the message and posted it here (it's in four parts; contains jpeg files and each part takes a minute to load). (I have inserted notes at a few places in this list -- my notes are in (parentheses) in this typeface.)

One shoulder harness snubber release mechanism bearing	One oxygen mask buckle with harness	numerous webbing pieces	Several survival vest material pieces
One snap hook	One possible radio beacon circuit board (This would be the circuit board from Hopper's beeper.)	One torso harness survival kit fitting	Four survival kit hold down hardware pieces
One harness yoke fitting	One possible survival kit cable	One life raft oral inflation tube	One survival kit attachment buckle
Three metal boot insole pieces	One safety pin	Various possible flight suit material portions	One RT-10 survival radio antenna section
One RT-10 survival radio battery	One RT-10 survival radio data plate	Three possible survival kit material pieces	Two document protector pieces
Numerous parachute canopy material pieces	One possible pilot parachute material piece	several .38 caliber ammunition fragments (Hopper was carrying a standard issue .38 cal. pistol)	four Velcro hook pieces
various snaps	miscellaneous zippers	two parachute container comes with grommet	three bayonet fitting pieces
two torso harness V-rings	three metal web belt hardware pieces	numerous grommets	one oxygen mask valve
one survival kit buckle	one lensatic compass eye piece (compass would have been in the survival kit)	one life raft boarding handle	several life preserver material and harness pieces
one Koch fitting	one possible container material piece	one strobe light battery cap	one torso harness adjustment buckle
one oxygen cylinder gauge	one button compass piece	one parachute riser link	one pen gun launcher section
One ejection seat piece part number MBEU 5241-8 (MBEU: Martin-Baker Ejection Unit, the standard F4 ejection seat. This means that the ejection seat was in the aircraft when it crashed.)	one ejection seat piece part number MBEU 657-H5	one ejection seat piece part number MBEU 57427	one ejection seat piece with part number MBEU 736H5-RB3262
several MK-13 signal flare pieces	one .38 caliber cartridge	various pieces of webbing	pieces of unidentified rubber
several snap fasteners	numerous pieces of unidentified metal	one pen gun bandoleer section	two flight manual cover pieces
one oxygen mask adjustment buckle	one survival kit attachment buckle	two ammunition casings	one life raft repair plug
various zipper teeth	numerous pieces of survival kit lid	one boot eyelet	several pieces of unidentified material
miscellaneous clot, webbing	pen gun flare fragment	several checklist fragments	several survival vest fragments
one parachute strap fragment	one equipment snap	one .38 caliber round	one possible G-suit fragment (Hopper would have been wearing a G-suit.)
one pen gun flare launcher	one zipper fragment	one MK-13 signal flare cap	one boot eyelet
one boot vent screen	numerous aircraft parts, including data plates and serial numbers	six buckles	one possible seat drogue chute connector link and webbing

The items listed above were examined by USAF life support specialists -- the people who design the ejection seats, survival gear, G-suits, anything having to do with enabling the crew to survive. This is what the life support specialists who examined the material from Hopper's aircraft said:

Comments

I do not know the status of attempts to identify the remains and teeth found in the crash site but that is irrelevant -- Hopper was the only man in the aircraft, he did not get out, any bone fragments or teeth in the crashsite are Hopper.

Update: 5 May 2002

LT Earl Hopper's remains -- recovered in the excavations described above -- were identified and the identification was approved on 16 January 2002. He is not missing and was never a prisoner. LT Hopper was not able to get out of his stricken aircraft and was killed when it crashed.

The Defense POW-Missing Personnel Office publishes regular updated lists of men who are accounted for as their remains are identified and as the identifications are approved by the respective service Secretaries. (See this article about the identification process.) You can view the latest updated "accounted-for" list here: http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/pmsea/pmsea_acc_p_name.pdf The link will open an Adobe file listing all individuals who have been accounted for. Search for the name "Hopper" and see for yourself.

MIA Facts Site

Captain Earl Hopper, Jr.:
The Facts

How to read this article

This is the phony story, unedited, exactly as it appears on a prominent MIA misinformation website.

Now, for the facts. The following is the phony story with facts inserted. This is what you are about to read:

Earl Hopper, Sr.

Closer examination

The Two-Man Crew

Ejection issues

The latest version of this incident

5,000 feet

What's Missing?

Update: November 2000

Crash site is investigated and excavated

The Findings

Comments

Update: 5 May 2002

MIA Facts Site

Captain Earl Hopper, Jr.: The Facts

How to read this article

This is the phony story, unedited, exactly as it appears on a prominent MIA misinformation website.

Now, for the facts. The following is the phony story with facts inserted. This is what you are about to read:

Earl Hopper, Sr.

Closer examination

The Two-Man Crew

Ejection issues

The latest version of this incident

5,000 feet

What's Missing?

Update: November 2000

Crash site is investigated and excavated

The Findings

Comments

Update: 5 May 2002

Captain Earl Hopper, Jr.:
The Facts