He could've easily got in a car accident driving to the practice and the same thing could've happened. You're out of bounds blaming someone who clearly loved his family and his daughter for a tragedy. All life is precious. Treasure the moments you have with your loved ones. Because you and your loved ones could pass away tomorrow on the Monday morning commute. No one would say. 'Oh this wouldn't have happened if you would've walked your kids to school'. Afterall someone could consider a car a rich man's toy.
I was at church this morning in Calabasas. Heard a helicopter buzz the building which was very unusual. After service heard the sad news and could see the smoke from the crash and emergency vehicles less than a mile behind our building. Another sad note is a lady I work with has a daughter who was set to play against Gianna’s team this morning. Tragic to many people on many levels.
Something weird happened on that flight. Look at the map of where it was supposed to land and then where it crashed. Then look at the video of the flight tracking data from the WaPo article. Watch midway, see it spin around and around, rapidly change altitude, and then resume it's flight. Pic of the flight tracking data but you need to see it on WaPo's site. https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/01/26/kobe-bryant-helicopter-crash/
Law enforcement told TMZ LAPD air support had been grounded due to the bad weather. Flight data shows the aircraft appeared to get into trouble above the LA Zoo where it circled at a very low altitude
I didn't even watch any games last night. Just a bit of the Raps game. Horrible, horrible news, and then to think of the fact that Giga was going to be maybe Kobe's most imporrtant basketball related legacy.
I’m thinking the heavy fog messed up the pilots visibility and he got lost?? Makes you wonder why he would decided to fly in that weather
The helicopter was heading to Mamba Sports Academy, 1011 Rancho Conejo Blvd. in Newbury Park two basketball games, one scheduled for noon, the other for 2 p.m. All games at the academy were canceled. After leaving the airport in Santa Ana at 9:06 a.m., the helicopter — which FlightRadar24 said was a Silkorsky S76-B with tail number N72EX — headed northwest in the direction of the 5 Freeway, staying to the west of that roadway. According to FlightRadar24’s data, the helicopter continued to follow the path of the 5 Freeway through the downtown LA area, heading up to Glendale. The helicopter circled around the Glendale area waiting for guidance from air traffic control, according to reports. The flight path shows the helicopter continuing to head north along the route of the 5 Freeway through Burbank, Sun Valley and Arleta. At San Fernando Mission Boulevard near White Oak Avenue in the Granada Hills area, the helicopter started to head south through the Northridge, Chatsworth and Winnetka areas, flying over Pierce College in Woodland Hills. It then headed west along the route of the 101 Freeway, making a turn to the south near Las Virgenes Road in the Calabasas area before crashing into a hillside near Las Virgenes Road and Willow Glen Street. The crash was reported to authorities at 9:47 a.m. https://www.dailynews.com/2020/01/26/map-kobe-bryant-helicopter-route-from-takeoff-to-deadly-crash/
Helicopters are way safer than cars. Blaming this tragedy on him 'having his rich boy's toys' is ridiculous. You are eight times more likely to die in a car accident, per 100.000 km, than a helicopter. They were using helicopters to commute for years.
Also I'm of the opinion that if you don't have anyone nice to say about the man on a day like this, just don't comment. Keep yourself from posting about Kobe for the next 1-2 weeks, it's not that difficult. Whatever he did or did not do, whatever was proven or not does not matter. It's undeniable that he had immense impact on the game we all love and that he did a lot of good outside of court and was an inspiration for many athletes and even just regular people around the world. Everyone has their weaknesses, he was no exception, but he was also a true great and did a lot of things he deserves huge credit for whether you like him or not.
"Between 2005 and 2009, there was an annual average of 1.44 fatalities (PDF) per 100,000 flying hours in nonmilitary helicopters. Over the same period, there were 13.2 traffic fatalities per 100,000 population in the United States annually. Since the average American spends around 780 hours per year (PDF) in the car, that means the fatality rate per 100,000 hours of driving time is just 0.017. Based on hours alone, helicopters are 85 times more dangerous than driving. Helicopters cover a lot more ground in an hour than a driver on the New Jersey Turnpike, so it might be better to come at the question from another angle. There are approximately 0.8 deaths on the interstate highway system for every 100 million miles traveled. There have been a fair number of studies on the average speed on the interstate system with varying results, but the average is probably somewhere around 68 miles per hour, give or take a few mph. That means it took drivers approximately 1.47 million hours to travel those 100 million miles, yielding a fatality rate of 0.054 per 100,000 hours in the car. By this measure, helicopter flying is just 27 times more dangerous than driving."
I've probably watched 8,000 NBA players over the years of being a fan. I suppose maybe a dozen of them have died that I noticed. This was definitely the most shocking. There were a lot of things I hated about the guy, but they've all been said a billion times, and it's not the time to bring them up. Dame said last night he was the best player he ever played against. Melo was nearly in tears in the post-game interview. It was hard to watch. After the year-long farewell retirement tour he had, I think he would have absolutely loved that the NBA will spend another half season (as they definitely will have to) celebrating his legacy. Celebrating his numbers twice with shot clock violations? He would've been all about that. But he also would've loved that teams continued to compete, because it's undeniable that he was an absolutely elite competitor. They'll probably rename the MVP trophy or the championship cup or something in his name. He had an ego and a drive that, in my opinion, could only be compared to Muhammad Ali. Kobe wasn't The Greatest, but he certainly had some greatness in him. The NBA is worsened by his loss.
Drazen, Len Bias and Reggie Lewis probably are the three that come closest. Yet, that was a different era. Drazen was somewhat like Kobe in Europe, though...
I was using this: https://thepointsguy.com/news/are-helicopters-safe-how-they-stack-up-against-planes-cars-and-trains/ Hours are not a good measure BTW. I must spend 100 hours in a car per month, easily, and 95% of that is in traffic at average speed of 15-20 mph, so that's not exactly dangerous. If I spent those 100 hours in a helicopter, from time along I'd be more likely to die but from ground covered it'd not be comparable at all. Choppers travel at well over 100 mph average, which cars don't. Still it's beside the point. Likelihood of dying in a helicopter accident are really, really small and all things considered they are very safe. Kobe was using his helicopter almost on a daily basis for years.