The Myth - Frank Morris and the Anglin brothers successfully escaped from Alcatraz prison using an inflatable raft made from rubber raincoats and made it to freedom.
Verdict - Plausible
Notes - The inmates' intended destination after escaping Alcatraz was Angel Island. The MythBusters theorized that the escapees used the tides to go to a different location. The makeshift raft crafted and crewed by the MythBusters team successfully made it across the bay and made it to the Marin Headlands. They declared it "Plausible" because the fate of the prisoners remains unknown. A portion of the scale tests (cut for time but later shown in "MythBusters Outtakes") also show that belongings of the prisoners' found in the bay afterwards could have been released by the prisoners and washed up where they were found through strategic use of the Bay's tides to throw the authorities off their trail. The mythbusters explored the idea that the escape raft washed ashore on Angel Island after making it to the Marin Headlands as a way to throw the FBI off the convicts' trail. Using a scale model of the San Francisco Bay area, the tide could have washed the raft onto Angel Island if released from the Marin Headlands, but as with their theory of the how the escape could have succeeded, no concrete evidence existed to prove or disprove the theory.
Jamie said that this was one myth they just had to test, since it is probably the most famous myth of San Francisco, where the show is based.[1]
