The 36 passengers were released at Sea-Tac without harm. Most of them were probably unaware of the full nature of the situation until they were allowed off the aircraft. Some gave statements to the FBI. Their accounts added to the pool of witness descriptions of Cooper, though their opportunities to observe him closely were limited compared to the crew who remained on board.
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## The FBI Composite: Creation and Limitations
The composite sketch known as Composite B—the one most widely reproduced in connection with the Cooper case—was developed through a process of consultation between FBI artists and multiple witnesses from Flight 305.
The initial sketches produced in the immediate aftermath of the hijacking were based primarily on the recollections of Florence Schaffner and Tina Mucklow. As the investigation gathered additional witness accounts, the sketches were refined. Composite B emerged by approximately 1973 as the FBI’s best reconstruction of Cooper’s appearance.
The sketch shows a man with regular features, dark hair, and a general appearance of a middle-aged American professional. It is a competent composite drawing that represents the honest best effort of the artists and witnesses who produced it.
It is also, necessarily, an approximation. The limitations of eyewitness description are well-documented in the forensic psychology literature. Witnesses to stressful events often have different perceptions of the same individual’s appearance, and memory is reconstructive rather than photographic—it can be influenced by subsequent information, by the questions asked during interviews, and by the passage of time. None of the witnesses on Flight 305 had any particular reason to study Cooper’s face carefully before the situation revealed itself as a hijacking. Once the situation became clear, they were presumably in a state of elevated stress that affects both perception and encoding.