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Helicopter carrying Kobe Bryant, 8 others did not have terrain warning system: NTSB
The helicopter that crashed in the Los Angeles suburb of Calabasas on Sunday, killing Kobe Bryant, his daughter and seven others, lacked a terrain awareness system that could have warned the pilot that he was approaching a hillside, the National Transportation Safety Board said Tuesday, according to a report. (www.foxnews.com) Más...Sort type: [Top] [Newest]
Even better (sarcasm) than the press, I heard tonight that Barbara Boxer just introduced legislation mandating TAWS in certain aircraft. Great, another self-proclaimed aviation "expert" (aka politician) who knows absolutely ZERO about aviation is now jumping in the action to demand a "fix" to something that wouldn't have made a hill of beans difference in this horrible accident.
Barbara Boxer plus her crony Nancy Pelosi(rips up Trump's speech. How childish is that) along with the media are one of the same; LIBERALS. They don't care if they don't know anything about flight. They just like POWER. Power over the people of this country and the media loves them because they make news. Boxer probably had to learn what TAWS means before her speech in congress.
echoing others...this is a solution looking for a problem. Terrain warning would have done nothing in this case...it's only useful as a "Warning", not as a last ditch attempt to escape terrain when hopelessly trapped...which it appears this flight was in the area they were in (big mountains--too low). Why this guy didn't just bite the bullet and try to set it done Anywhere in a hover is hard to fathom. We'll never know. My wag is that the old "pressure to go with the celebs on board" was just too great.
Its a very common misconception, that I also once believed, that helicopters can just stop and hover to the ground anytime they want. In getting my commercial rotorcraft add-on I learned the truth. You need excellent visual cues to hover a helicopter, something this pilot ran out of. He did pass up many opportunities to land but once in that pass and zero zero , flying it out or crashing were the only options. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to fly it out.
Van Nuys was reporting an 1,100 ft ceiling. Field elevation at Van Nuys is 802 so the clouds were around 2,000 MSL. Maybe, as the pilot followed the 101 westbound, toward rising terrain, the ground kept getting closer & closer. Maybe, due to his speed, he pulled up to avoid the terrain, not clouds below him. Up into IMC conditions. Just my 2 cents. :/
Considering the common weather conditions in this area, my money's on him getting away with this
When the press suggests that it was wrong for the helicopter to be flying without TAWS and that TAWS would have prevented the accident, it is just another example of the press making judgements without knowledge. All for the purpose of creating apparent scandal, for clicks.