FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP/The Loop) — The Federal Aviation Administration has opened its own investigation into the 50-mile flight of the helium balloon that briefly delayed flights at Denver International Airport after a couple reported that their 6-year-old son may have been on board, an official said Tuesday. What is FFA and what are their regulations? Click here for more information.

FAA spokesman Mike Fergus said the agency investigates civil allegations rather than criminal ones. He declined to provide details on the nature of the FAA probe or its possible outcome.

Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden has said investigators believe amateur storm chasers Richard and Mayumi Heene called 911 Thursday saying they thought their son, Falcon, was aboard the large helium balloon that floated away from their yard in Fort Collins in a bid to get publicity for a reality TV show.

The balloon landed 50 miles away near Denver International Airport. Some flights had to be changed to a different runway for 20 minutes.

Falcon was found safe at home.

Alderden said he is seeking charges against the Heenes including conspiracy, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, making a false report to authorities, and attempting to influence a public servant. The most serious charges are felonies and carry a maximum sentence of six years in prison.

Falcon Henne"Balloon Boy" and father Richard Heene

Alderden said authorities also would be seeking restitution for the costs of the balloon chase, though he didn’t provide a figure.

His office has said it will likely be sometime next week before it forwards its findings to prosecutors to decide on charges.

Richard Heene previously has denied a hoax.

He emerged briefly from the family’s home Tuesday morning but didn’t answer reporters’ questions.

Heene did show two delivery workers where to find five leased helium tanks that were being returned to Flexx Productions, a Fort Collins rental company. The workers said four of the tanks were empty and one was partially full.

An associate of Heene’s, Robert Thomas, has told sheriff’s investigators that he helped record Heene’s ideas for a TV show, said Thomas’ attorney, Linda Lee.

Lee said Monday that Heene was “obsessed” with trying to land a TV show and become famous.

“Heene believes the world is going to end in 2012,” she said. “Because of that, he wanted to make money quickly, become rich enough to build a bunker or something underground, where he can be safe from the sun exploding.”

Thomas told NBC’s “Today” show on Tuesday that he had nothing to do with the hoax and didn’t know about the balloon being launched until he saw it on television. Asked whether he should be profiting by selling his story, Thomas, who described himself as an entrepreneur and a college student, said he was told that people sell their stories to the media and that he was paid “way less than most people think.” Did Falcon Heene admit to the ballon flight being a stunt? Click here to find out.

Thomas helped Richard Heene organize his thoughts and worked with him from March to May, Lee said. Thomas’ notes include Richard Heene discussing a hoax that involved a balloon to make it seem like there was a UFO, Lee said.

Lee said investigators told her Thomas would not face charges but that she was seeking immunity for him “just to be safe.” Thomas has said he had no idea that a possible hoax could involve the Heene children.

The Heenes twice appeared on ABC’s “Wife Swap,” including a March episode in which they discuss their approach to parenting and talk about their belief that they’re the descendants of aliens.

The producer of “Wife Swap” had a show in development with the Heenes but said the deal is now off. The TLC cable network also said Heene had pitched a reality show months ago, but it passed on the offer. See the family here on the 100th episode of “Wife Swap”

Want to play the Balloon Boy game? Click here!!!

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Associated Press writers Dan Elliott and Colleen Slevin in Denver and Greg Risling in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

By:Brooke Fontana

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP/The Loop) — A piece of skull with a bullet hole through it that Russian officials claimed belonged to Adolf Hitler actually came from a woman, scientists at the University of Connecticut concluded.

The cranium fragment is part of a collection of Hitler artifacts preserved by Soviet intelligence in the months after Hitler and Eva Braun reportedly committed suicide in a Berlin bunker in April 1945.

The collection, now housed in the Russian State Archive in Moscow, also includes bloodstained pieces of the sofa where Hitler reportedly shot himself after taking a cyanide pill. The artifacts were put on public display in 2000.

Skull fragment was thought to be Adolf Hitler's

Connecticut archaeologist Nick Bellantoni was asked to examine the skull and blood samples for a History Channel documentary on Hitler’s death that aired this month.

Bellantoni said his initial forensic exam of the skull fragment showed it didn’t match what he knew of Hitler’s biology.

“The bone was very small and thin, and normally male bones are much more robust in our species,” Bellantoni said Tuesday. “I thought it probably came from a woman or a younger man.”

Bellantoni then took several pinhead-size pieces of the skull fragment and swabs of the blood stains back to the university for analysis.

Linda Strausbaugh, a professor of molecular and cell biology, got help from two former students who work in the New York City medical examiner’s office. The former students, Craig O’Connor and Heather Nelson, are experts in working with challenging DNA samples and were able to extract enough DNA from the bone pieces to do a forensic study, Strausbaugh said.

She said they determined that the DNA came from a 20- to 40-year-old woman. The skull fragment could have come from Braun, but to know that, the lab would need samples of her DNA, she said. Also, the DNA samples were very degraded, making identification unlikely, Strausbaugh said.

Witnesses never reported Braun being shot in the head, Bellantoni said, and she is thought to have died of cyanide poisoning.

“This person, with a bullet hole coming out the back of the head, would have been shot in the face, in the mouth or underneath chin,” he said. “It would have been hard for them to miss that.”

DNA from the bloodstain swabs showed at least some of it came from a man, Strausbaugh said.

“The DNA is relatively degraded and we don’t have a full range of markers that we’d like to have,” she said.

Russian officials have said Hitler and Braun’s bodies were removed from a shell crater outside the bunker shortly after he died.

An autopsy allegedly showed Hitler’s body was missing part of his cranium. A Soviet team went back to the crater in 1946 and allegedly found the piece of cranium that the UConn scientists examined.

Russian officials have said the rest of Hitler was buried beneath a Soviet army parade ground in the former East German city of Magdeburg. They said his remains were exhumed in 1970 and incinerated, and the ashes were flushed into the city’s sewage system.

Both Strausbaugh and Bellantoni said there is nothing in their findings that significantly challenges the conclusion that Hitler died in the bunker.

“My gut feeling is he did commit suicide there, and maybe the blood sample we found is his,” Bellantoni said.

“What this does is it raises a question: If this is not him who is it?” he later added. “And, two, what really happened there?”