Kobe Bryant and 4 others die in heli crash
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https://www.khou.com/article/news/l...rash/285-c5c98d95-96ef-4e77-a7ed-46494744e072
Former UH baseball captain, his wife and daughter killed in helicopter crash with Kobe Bryant
John Altobelli was a baseball coach at Orange Coast College in California. In his playing days, he was a two-year starter at the University of Houston.
Altobelli's brother, Tony, is the sports information director at the school. He said his 56-year-old brother died along with his wife, Keri, and daughter, Alyssa. Alyssa played on the same basketball team as Bryant’s daughter, Gianna, the Associated Press reports.
Tragic for the remaining brother and sister.
Former UH baseball captain, his wife and daughter killed in helicopter crash with Kobe Bryant
John Altobelli was a baseball coach at Orange Coast College in California. In his playing days, he was a two-year starter at the University of Houston.
Altobelli's brother, Tony, is the sports information director at the school. He said his 56-year-old brother died along with his wife, Keri, and daughter, Alyssa. Alyssa played on the same basketball team as Bryant’s daughter, Gianna, the Associated Press reports.
Tragic for the remaining brother and sister.
Did someone do that here? I must have missed it. Now, my friends who have already sent me dank memes are guilty as charged.
Apparently so. I didn't see the shenanigans either.
There are a lot of Spurs fans here.
I am very sad for him and his family.
Very tragic loss of lives. As a helicopter pilot in my younger years I remember that it takes about 6 seconds for a non-instrument rated pilot to lose control when flying into instrument conditions. The helicopter being flown in this situation was probably well equipped to fly in instrument conditions but probably the pilot was flying visually and lost sight of rising terrain in bad weather. We need to wait for the NTSB report and this is speculation but probably it will be pilot error. Many aircraft have been lost when there is the pressure of "we must get there on time".
I posted your you tube link in another forum and this is the response from someone there.
From the looks of this (along with several other articles with credible data) it appears that this pilot would have had no problem with making the flight from where he had been circling in a holding pattern over Glendale straight through to the 101 that would lead him to the Mamba Center in Thousand Oaks. Ara Zobayan, the S-76 pilot (although instrument rated) was flying under 'special VFR rules' for this flight even though the conditions were marginal at best. Under the rules governing his flight it was up to him to maintain visual references along his route in order to identify his position. After he was given clearance to proceed from the holding pattern he was asked to fly northwest using I-5 as as his reference (instead of due west) close to San Fernando before making a gradual turn to the west and then southwest. Under the Visual Flight Rules he would then fly southwest until he flew over the 101, then would turn right and follow the 101 as his visual reference into Thousand Oaks.
The idea of flying over a major highway as a VFR route provides two distinct advantages. One is that is is like being over a giant map... it's easy to see exactly where you are going as long as you fly below the cloud layer (which is required under visual flight rules). But the second (and most important in an area of quick elevation changes) is that the highways run between the high mountain ranges that are all over southern California.
So the problem with having to make the big loop around to the northwest and then back down to the intended flight path over the 101 is that in the event the pilot would encounter a thick patch of fog or a rapidly changing ceiling is that if he had temporarily been blanketed by a lowering ceiling or fog bank, he would have been blinded to 101 which would be his reference to begin his right turn and fly west over the Hwy 101. The danger with that comes in the form of how quickly the terrain rises on that southwest path he was on once he passed over the 101. If the ceiling had indeed dropped prior to him reaching the 101, he would have been required to descend in order to maintain his visual references. In the Louisiana oilfield flights into lowering ceilings as you head out over the marsh and the Gulf is what we call Scud Running (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scud_running), and the helicopter pilots had to make sure that the layer didn't lower all the way to the surface. In some cases even a 180° turn could leave you trapped if the 'scud' also lowered in the area you came from.
Mr. Zobayan was an IFR pilot, yet he probably chose to make a VFR flight for several reasons. One is that he wouldn't need to get into the IFR system and be directed by controllers every step of the way for a relatively short flight to Thousand Oaks that he had made (possibly) hundreds of times. It's also possible that when they left Santa Ana the conditions may have looked a lot better than it actually turned out to be by the time they reached Glendale and was put in a holding pattern. He may have had a higher level of confidence as an IFR pilot knowing that his aircraft was also IFR rated and could revert to an IFR flight plan if needed.
However, if he did encounter some rapidly lowering ceilings as he approached his intersection of the 101, he may have relied on his instrument prowess to fly through the fog/low ceiling rather than to descend and watch for that highway now passing underneath him. At the speed that he was flying, even if he was only in IFR conditions for a few moments, he would have quickly reached the rapidly rising terrain and the eventual ridge that the S-76 impacted once he flew southwest past the point he needed to make an immediate right turn over the 101. In fact, the reports indicate that he was already flying too low to have been followed by the traffic radar.
So it appears that for whatever reason, Mr. Zobayan missed his turn and found his aircraft approaching a ridge of hills that he was not yet anticipating. The early evidence at the scene seems to indicate that he may have gotten a visual on the ridge in his flight path and stalled the rotor blades trying to pull up to avoid the impact. It will be a while before we receive the official word on why he continued flying southwest over the 101, but it seems obvious to me that he never saw it and didn't know that he had just passed over it moments earlier. If it were the flat marshes of Louisiana, he would have just made the course correction another mile or so and got his aircraft back on his intended route over that VFR highway. But he didn't have that luxury over the hills of Southern California. This tragedy may have simply been a case of being overly confident in his piloting skills.
Sad. I'm not a basketball fan and I don't know much about Kobe but a chopper full of people died, including Kobe & his daughter, and that is sad.
You seem to have a decent understanding of this stuff. So how does him pulling up on the stick at the last second translate into what the other 8 individuals in the back experienced? Basically it sounds like they slammed into a mountain at around 180 mph, so not much time or cause to panic for the passengers.
I didn't even hear about it until late last night, and while I know who he is, it's not one of those, you'll remember where you were when you heard the news like some have tried to make it out to be.
But a guy with his daughter, along with other passengers, I would hope it was over quickly for them instead of a long panic toward the crash. Even with the rotor stall, it couldn't have been too long of a panic if any at all.
FireInTheWire
Caprock Crusader
Eye witnesses said they passed over head just doing 4-6mph. Sounded to me they were wondering cautiously in the fog
Sorry for the confusion. That was copied from a post in another forum. Here is a link to it with a few more responses.
https://saintsreport.com/threads/tmz-reports-kobe-bryant-killed-in-crash.424699/page-17
I'm a Spurs fan and as far as I'm concerned, real Spurs fans may love to hate a rival when it comes to game-time, but Kobe was the kind of rival to also be respected. Just look at how moved Pop and the guys were. Truly gut-wrenching that this happened. It's been real somber around the airport.
How can you have an eyewitness gauge as speed at 4 mph in a fog so heavy the pilot can't see a mountain in front of him? At 4 - 6 mph, a helicopter crash (bump) into the ground is survivable. I've seen some choppers come in so hard that everyone around hit the deck and covered their head (except for the butter bar) and nothing came apart. The guys inside just said the landing felt a bit rough. I'd estimate the landing well North of 30 mph in a helicopter built back in the 60's.
FireInTheWire
Caprock Crusader
I know and agree man. I'm thinking the pilot dropped down slowly under the fog... then proceeded forward in what he thought was right on his gauges... and flew into the hillside. I dont think he was hauling A though
Another said that the pilot climbed over 1000' to get on radar for tracking, then descended suddenly at over 5,000 ft/min just before impact. It was not clear what the reason for the rapid descent was...
