RIP Kobe. You'll be missed. Your family will be in our thoughts and prayers.
I live 40 miles inland from the coast in the metropolitan Los Angeles area. There was a thick (low) fog that blanketed the basin this morning. An
unconfirmed report said that the helicopter crashed into the side of a mountain. I can believe that. The ceiling couldn't have been more than 200'.
I can normally see the mountains to the north which are only 2 miles from my home. Not today. It's only 11 miles from Calabasas to the Malibu beach coastline. No doubt the fog was much thicker that close to the coast. I wonder how could an experienced (supposedly) pilot did not know where the nearby mountain ranges were? I'm sure we'll get more details throughout the day. This will be the lead story on every news cast.
"Bryant was on his way to a travel basketball game with his 13-year-old daughter Gianna Bryant when the helicopter crashed, sources told ESPN's Wojnarowski. Those aboard the helicopter also included another player and parent. According to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, there were no survivors of the crash. An investigation is ongoing."
"Kobe Bryant, former NBA superstar, has died in a helicopter crash in California. Five people were on the helicopter Bryant was aboard when it crashed near Calabasas, according to TMZ Sports. The crash was called in by mountain bikers, who spotted the downed helicopter sitting several hundred feet off the road."
Post edit - "LOS ANGELES -- The helicopter carrying Kobe Bryant didn't have a recommended warning system to alert the pilot he was too close to land, but it's not clear it would have prevented the crash that killed nine on Sunday because the pilot might have lost control as the
aircraft plunged into a fog-shrouded mountain, federal officials said Tuesday.
Pilot Ara Zobayan was climbing out of the clouds when the aircraft banked left and began a sudden descent that lasted nearly a minute.
"This is a pretty steep descent at high speed," said Jennifer Homendy of the National Transportation Safety Board. "We know that this was a high-energy impact crash."
The aircraft was intact when it hit the ground, but the impact of the crash spread debris over more than 500 feet. The last of the bodies and the wreckage were recovered from the Calabasas, California, hillside Tuesday, authorities said.
Autopsies confirmed the deaths of Bryant, Zobayan, John Altobelli and Sarah Chester, the medical examiner reported. The names of the five other victims have not been released, but they have been publicly identified as Bryant's 13-year-old daughter Gianna; Chester's 13-year-old daughter, Payton; Altobelli's wife, Keri, and daughter Alyssa; and Christina Mauser, a girls' basketball coach at a Southern California elementary school."
I'm in shock and I'm numb. Laker Nation lost a great one today.
ESPN news report -
The sports world mourns the death of Kobe Bryant
www.tmz.com
