As the world mourns NBA legend Kobe Bryant, 41, his second oldest daughter Gianna, 13, and seven others who perished in a helicopter crash Sunday, it has been learned the pilot received special approval to fly in the foggy weather. According to the New York Times, “the helicopter was given what is known as Special Visual Flight Rules clearance, meaning they could proceed through Burbank’s airspace on a foggy morning in Southern California.”
Bryant and his fellow passengers were en route to the Mamba Sports Academy where Gianna, affectionately known as Gigi, played basketball and Bryant was her team’s coach. The helicopter went down near Calabasas, California after making a “climbing left turn,” ESPN reported. Audio from the flight reveals the pilot’s communications. Air traffic controllers told him he was flying too low for them to track the flight.
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It was so cloudy on Sunday that LAPD their helicopters wouldn’t have normally flown in those conditions, said Yvette Tuning, a sergeant and watch commander for the Los Angeles Police Department’s (LAPD) Air Support Division.
“But yesterday when I came to work I immediately saw it as I came down into the valley, that it was just socked in … So I already knew we” — meaning L.A.P.D. Air Support — “weren’t going to be flying unless it burned off quick. And it did not burn off quick,” Tuning said.
Along with Bryant and Gigi, the other victims of the crash included college baseball coach John Altobelli, his wife Keri and their daughter Alyssa who was Gigi’s teammate; mother and daughter Sarah and Payton Chester; basketball coach Christina Mauser; and the pilot, Ara Zobayan.
Authorities are still investigating the exact cause of the crash and doing recovery at the crash site.
