Prisoners Who Escaped Alcatraz Could Be Alive

A new computer simulation shows that the prisoners who escaped from Alcatraz in 1962 may have not died during the run for freedom, but might have survived after all.

At the American Geophysical Union fall meeting in San Francisco this week, the computer simulation of the bay showed that the three inmates may have made it safely to land and freedom. The famed escape has been documented in movies and books but the outcome has always been a mystery. But this new reconstruction might just turn all of those theorists on their heads.

Alcatraz Island (Photo Credit: Wikipedia)

On the night of June 12^th, 1962, three inmates used a raft made of raincoats to escape from the maximum security prison island in San Francisco. It has always remained a mystery what happened to them and their fate has been the subject of much debate.

“In this presentation, we try to shed light on this historic case using a visualization of a high-resolution hydrodynamic simulation of the San Francisco Bay, combined with historical tidal records,” the presentation states. “By reconstructing the hydrodynamic conditions and using a particle based simulation of the escapees we show possible scenarios. The interactive model is visualized using both a 3D photorealistic and web based visualization.”

The reconstruction of the escape (Photo Credit: AGU)

The three bank robbers spent about six months preparing for their escape and once they left The Rock they were never seen again. The Dutch team that presented the information in San Francisco reconstructed the bay’s hydrodynamic conditions, and combined that with decades old tidal records, and then used particles to simulate the movement of the raft.

“Although these hydrodynamic simulations only provide circumstantial evidence for solving the mystery of what happened during the foggy dark night of June 12, 1962, it can be used as a guidance and provides an interesting test case to apply interactive modelling,” said the authors.

The homemade paddle found by the FBI (Photo Credit: FBI)

Depending on the time the inmates launched their raft they could have ended up toward the direction of Angel Island, were a homemade paddle and personal belongings were found by the FBI at the time. Or they could have been pushed back into the Bay, or perhaps south towards Oakland. Whatever the outcome of the three men, it will forever remain a mystery.

The FBI officially closed their case on the escape on December 31^st, 1979 and turned over responsibility to the U.S. Marshals Service which continues to investigate the unlikely scenario that the men are still alive.