So before we talk about speculation, let's look at the facts.
In February 1980, $5800 of Cooper's money is found at Tena Bar, with the rubber bands still intact (but fragile). The bills are deteriorated near the periphery of the stacks. As Andrade notes:
1) There are no watersheds that could conceivably bring the bills to the Columbia River at Tena Bar
2) No evidence supports the landing zone being wrong
3) Tom Kaye, on his Citizen Sleuths website, and in interviews in other books...., has shown, rather conclusively, that there are no natural means by which the money could have gotten to the Tena Bar in the condition they were in, the location they were in.
4) The bills were found stacked on top of each other, with the rubber bands still attached
5) The bills were so perfectly aligned, the ink from their serial numbers bled into each other without variation in location
6) To have three stacks of money land on top of each other, somehow bury themselves in the sand on a popular fishing location, in less than a square foot of space, by natural processes alone, beggars belief. They had to have been buried there by human hands (Kaye, again)
7) At least 35 more $20 bills have been identified from the fragments of money found at Tena Bar
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LoginSo now we know that there were 3 bundles of money found, along with numerous fragments of money. The Citizen Sleuths, who seem to have invested a great deal of time and effort into evaluating rubber bands, the way money behaves in water, and the decay process for the money, state that the money had to arrive at Tena Bar within 1 year of the hijacking. You can read their conclusions at the link below.
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LoginAnother piece of evidence comes from the Mountain News, when it is reported that 2 young fishermen find pieces of money on Tena Bar, some up to 100 yards apart from one another, just prior to Brian Ingram's discovery.
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LoginSo now I will defer to a quote a few weeks back from Shutter, filed on page 76 of the "Flight Path and Related Issues" thread.
"Sometimes things turn out a lot simpler than we make them out to be"

« Last Edit: October 25, 2016, 10:51:54 AM by Shutter »
So given all this information on the money find; the well-aligned bills in the stacks, the still-intact rubber bands, their location all within one ft^2, and the lack of support to any natural flow-down theory, what more simple, concise, and logical explanation can we find for this money other than the one where Cooper mistakenly drops four bundles of money here at Tena Bar the night of the hijacking?
Notice I say four (4) bundles. We know about the three bundles that are found with the rubber bands still intact. However, at least 35 other bills have been identified from the fragments. And some fragments were noticed prior to the money find at distances of 100 yards away. It would seem that the fourth bundle did not fare as well as the other three. It may have been closer to the surface and its rubber band broke. These bills, more deteriorated than the others, began to wash away with the water currents and even blow away in the wind. Thus their fragments were scattered along the beach and ultimately buried from the action of the waves, flooding, and tidal action.
As I have discussed before in this forum, the original drop zone is correct (also supported by the Citizen Sleuths). Cooper landed safely and was actually seen walking in the Ariel, WA area that night.
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LoginFrom his landing spot, Cooper walked to his small boat along the Lewis River (just downstream from the Merwin Dam), and escaped via the Lewis River to Tena Bar. Since it was cold, dark, and rainy when he got to Tena Bar, Cooper mistakenly loses 4 bundles of his cash as he transfers it to his pickup truck. This lost money is what was found by Brian Ingram in early 1980.
It doesn't get any simpler than that!