By John Askounis/ info@eurohoops.net
Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven more people were killed on Sunday morning. The names of the rest of the victims of the tragic helicopter crash were confirmed via various social media posts.
John Altobelli, the head baseball coach at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, his wife Keri and their daughter Alyssa, Sarah Chester and her daughter Payton, Christina Mauser, top assistant coach of the travel basketball team, and pilot Ara Zobayan perished as well.
They were on their way to a AAU basketball game when the helicopter went down. According to publicly available flight records, the group departed around 9:06 a.m, from the John Wayne Airport. Passed over Boyle Heights, near Dodger Stadium, and circled over Glendale during the flight. The crash occurred before 10 a.m. Authorities received the first 911 call at 9:47 a.m.
Foggy conditions
The NBA great often used his private Sikorsky S-76 helicopter with no prior incidents or accidents. This time something went wrong with the chopper bursting into flames in the hills above Calabasas amid foggy conditions.
The Los Angeles Police Department’s Air Support Division grounded its helicopters and didn’t fly until later in the afternoon due to the severe fog. “The weather situation did not meet our minimum standards for flying” department spokesman Josh Rubenstein said.
Officials have restricted the area to residents only in their effort to reinforce their investigation that can potentially last for an extended period of time. Recovering the bodies might take several days due to the rough terrain.