27 January 2020 — 1123 mst
A note on the crash that killed Kobe Bryant
Former basketball player Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter, and seven other died yesterday when the 1991 Skikorsky S-76B helicopter in which they were flying crashed in the hills north of Los Angeles.
According to California authorities, the coastal fog was so dense that the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s helicopters were grounded. CNN reports that air traffic control green lighted the Skikorsky’s pilot to fly in the conditions that grounded the sheriff:
The helicopter was operating under “special visual flight rules,” according to an air traffic control conversation with the pilot, captured by website LiveATC.net.
An SVFR clearance allows a pilot to fly in weather conditions worse than those allowed for standard visual flight rules (VFR).
The Burbank Airport control tower allowed the helicopter to proceed northeast, following the Interstate 5 highway, using the SVFR clearance.
Why Bryant’s pilot was flying in such conditions — was he offered extra money to take the risk? — will be one focus of the National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation. What was the effect of Bryant's celebrity status on the decision making of the pilot and ATC?
The Los Angeles Times reported that a witness heard the helicopter flying low and “spluttering,” a comment from which one may be tempted to infer the possibility of engine trouble. That conclusion could be correct, but the spluttering sound might simply be an acoustical effect generated by the noise of the rotor echoing off the hills and being sporadically muted by the fog. That both engines would fail seems improbable, and the loss of one engine should not doom the aircraft to a fatal crash.
The Skikorsky S-76B is a fast, $15 million, twin turboshaft, helicopter designed for civilian use. It can carry 13 passengers, and reportedly is a popular choice for tasks such as ferrying crews to offshore oil and gas rigs. Whether the aircraft’s age was a factor in the crash remains to be determined. In theory, a 29-year-old aircraft, if maintained properly, can be safe to fly. In practice, a company using a bird that old may have such meagre resources that skimping on maintenance occurs.
Bryant’s accomplishments on the basketball court are being covered extensively by the mainstream media and need not be recounted here.