For the technical forum without the GD stuff, I have some questions.

As best I can tell, the pilot of Kobe's Sikorsky S-76 was following and attempted a 180. Is turning a helicopter in forward flight the same as a fixed-wing airplane? Could the pilot have slowed first and then made the turn successfully instead of continuing at well over 100kts? Would the S76 with 9 pax at 1000ft have any trouble hovering, or would a pilot have not wanted to change to a hover in such limited visibility? Is there loading in an aggressive turn that can affect things like retreating blade stall speed like an accelerated stall in a fixed wing airplane? Does it seem like he was cruising along, entered a fog bank and simply attempted a 180 without consideration of terrain, or have received a TAWS alert, attempted to climb in the turn recklessly and ended up flying into a hillside by overbanking?

That's a lot of speculation with virtually no information on the same day of the crash.

I'll speculate!  like most helicopter crashes that happen in poor weather, the most likely explanation is the pilot flew unintentionally into low enough visibility to get disoriented and flew into the ground.  In a helicopter, as long as you can see the ground, it's very easy to fly vfr in extremely low visibility so people do it frequently.  Unfortunately "low visibility" frequently changes to "not enough visibility" very quickly when fog or clouds are involved.  The immediate loss of visual references is difficult no matter your experience level and causes a lot of crashes.

The radar data you posted makes it look like he might have climbed into the clouds as he climbed to get through the hills and attempted to descend as he turned around.  In a helicopter when you reduce the collective the aircraft pitches nose down.  If he lost a visual horizon and was flying using outside references(ie vfr) that could easily explain the rapid speed increase and descent.  Note that the time from the start of the descent to the crash was about 15 seconds - not a lot of time to think about what to do.

A quick google of the pilot's name shows people saying he was "very attentive to kobe's needs".  I imagine there will be all sorts of speculation about his "get-home-itis" manifesting as "get-Kobe-to-the-game-itis" as well.

But all speculation!  Maybe something broke and he was turning towards the closest available spot to land but couldn't get on the ground in time.  Unlikely, but stranger things have happened!

Appreciated. In terms of speculation, the questions were technical regarding helicopter flight dynamics, but prefaced passively to indicate my ignorance. I should know better than to use such phrases, as prefaces can receive too much focus: “a well-regulated militia,...”

Flight controls do the same thing in airplanes and helicopters, only difference is the thrust is vertical on a chopper instead of horizontal on a plane.

Helicopters get less stable as you slow down due mainly to less airflow over the vertical and horizontal tails, most helicopters have minimum speeds for ifr flight because of this and afcs functions changing base on airspeed.  Sure he could have slowed down, but chances are he was looking for outside visual references and lost track of his airspeed.  The initial 100-120kts is a comfortable speed that is stable and not ridiculously fast in an s76.

9 people is a bunch in an s76 but not automatically too many - can't evaluate the hover capability without knowing the aircraft configuration, fuel state, etc.  you can't hover without visual references, esp. at altitude far from the ground.  He took off though and burned a bunch of fuel, so he could've landed.

A helicopter turns just like an airplane, but you can't stall a helicopter.  Blades can stall, but severe retreating blade stall is self correcting as the aircraft will pitch nose up, thus slowing down.  At the radar ground speeds in your graph blade stall wouldn't happen until possibly the last few seconds and even then is unlikely.  Wikipedia says vne in a s76c is 155.

An s76 is a serious civilian helicopter, I assume it has a fdr and they'll figure everything out beyond doubt.

Too add more speculation, it seems the pilot was civilian trained.  Very few civilian helicopters are ifr certified and in my experience civilians don't place much training on "inadvertent imc" compared to the military.  It's painfully common, even in the military, to say "I can still see the ground and can land if it gets worse".  That's true until your 200m visibility drops to 50m instantly and you can't see the ground, then you have no option but to go ifr, and that is a difficult transition to complete in a few seconds.

Lastly, as far as I know every s76 ever made has a full autopilot(i.e. Cyclic, pedal, and collective actuators) so all he had to do is commit to ifr, engage the autopilot, and climb away.  Same situation as the Guard Blackhawk in Florida a few years ago that killed a bunch of marines if the obvious weather speculation is correct, there was a big thread on it here.

"As best I can tell, the pilot of Kobe's Sikorsky S-76 was following and attempted a 180."
Was he though? The final turn may have been inadvertent or closer to 180 degrees due to disorientation.

"Is turning a helicopter in forward flight the same as a fixed-wing airplane?"
From the pilot perspective it is very similar. A fixed wing pilot could fly a helicopter in cruise flight with no instruction.

"Could the pilot have slowed first and then made the turn successfully instead of continuing at well over 100kts?"
When encountering unexpectedly bad conditions, helicopters generally slow down, come down, then turn around. It is impossible to say exactly what he was doing or if/when he entered IMC.

"Would the S76 with 9 pax at 1000ft have any trouble hovering, or would a pilot have not wanted to change to a hover in such limited visibility?"
That aircraft could certainly hover in ground effect (HIGE), hover out of ground effect (HOGE) was probably achievable but borderline. However, you can't hover in IMC. Transitioning from forward flight to hover (inadvertently) is what kills a bunch of helicopter pilots during IIMC.

"Is there loading in an aggressive turn that can affect things like retreating blade stall speed like an accelerated stall in a fixed wing airplane?"
If you are at that point, you have already completely lost control and will crash regardless of exceeding aerodynamic limits.

"Does it seem like he was cruising along, entered a fog bank and simply attempted a 180 without consideration of terrain, or have received a TAWS alert, attempted to climb in the turn recklessly and ended up flying into a hillside by overbanking?"
No. Looking at WX and ADS-B data it appears he inadvertently entered IMC lost control of the aircraft and crashed. He may have been trying to do a 180 or he may have unknowingly entered a bank. His extreme rate of decent and speed increase on ADS-B makes it look like he became task saturated or distracted, the aircraft became upset and he did not realize or could not recover before hitting the mountain.

"The initial 100-120kts is a comfortable speed that is stable and not ridiculously fast in an s76."
I agree

"Wikipedia says vne in a s76c is 155."
It is 155 for all models IIRC

"Very few civilian helicopters are ifr certified and in my experience civilians don't place much training on "inadvertent imc" compared to the military."
You are not getting a job as an S-76 pilot without an instrument rating. Most jobs will require an ATP or you get your ATP after you are hired.

"Lastly, as far as I know every s76 ever made has a full autopilot(i.e. Cyclic, pedal, and collective actuators)"
A models, as far as I have seen, do not have any AP/FD coupling capability. C+/C++ have 2-axis coupling capability (pitch and roll). So you can couple to IAS or VS for vertical guidance and HDG or FMS for lateral guidance. There is no collective coupling similar to auto throttles, the pilot is the only actuator for the collective. Based on the pics I looked at online this B model had an autopilot similar to the C models I used to fly.


ETA: Correction
It’s been a few years since I flew the 76, and we would fly in a 2-axis configuration during cruise. Our C models did have collective coupling, and the pics of Kobe’s B model AP panel looks the same as ours did, so they probably did have full AP system.

OST for more info and less bullshit than the GD thread.

Thanks for the notification in the GD thread. What a shit show.

Does it seem like the pilot lost sight of the terrain and just flew into the side of a steep hill or did he make a mistake while turning and "side swiped" the mountain? Wasn't the last known speed, possibly at impact, ~ 170mph?

It is impossible to say at this point, exactly what happened, hopefully the FDR/CVR were both operating and will paint a full picture.

Based on ADS-B data and local WX reports I suspect the pilot entered IMC and lost control. Even in autorotation a helicopter will not normally have a ROD of -4,800FPM. I would expect the FDR to show bank angles up to if not exceeding 90 degrees and/or a pitch attitudes of -30 degrees.

In for answers. My uncle was killed by  controlled flight into water in a 76 . Always sad .

I've only ever seen newer models, never imagined they were so old the originals wouldn't have an autopilot.  Shows what happens when I assume!

I didn't say not instrument rated, that's a given.  Actually practicing "IIMC" is common in the military world, esp. in the Army since it kills so many people.  ie. actually executing your weather abort plan in flight without knowing ahead of time.  Good commanders will do it when the plan will actually take you into the clouds to make it real.  I have yet to see that in the civilian world.

No matter for now - such a high profile crash investigation will leave no stone unturned.  Only question is how long we have to wait for the report.

I'm here to learn about what may have happened and the ends and out of that helicopter.
That thread in GD should've had a few people banned from being able to post in that Kobe thread since they can now ban just from a thread and 1 person should've caught a site ban.

I got a question.
I tend to watch youtube avation videos from Premier1 Driver,310 Pilot, Stevio, CitationMax and a few others.
Wanted to be a pilot but never did it. Used to sim but anyway back to the point
I notice on some of the MFD especially in the Jets it'll show an animation of the runway and I know on the GPS systems it'll put a line if you're going to direct to something.

Is there no a package maybe helis that has topographically information to maybe give you a 3D look or even flying over highways that you could look at to navigate when in the soup, maybe have you need to be at this altitude at this location and if you go below it, the altitude maybe displays in yellow and then red if you get way too low?

I guess in a dumb down way. Is there nothing like a google maps that you can fly with that has an overlay of the ground and street names along with safe flying heights and navigate with that since you're already on instruments until you're clear of the bad weather?

We had some old A++ model 76s. They were all steam gauge, no AP, no FADEC aircraft where you did all the piloting and some motor beeping.

I flew S76s and AW139 with numerous civilian trained pilots and they were trained and knew what you were supposed to do, but actually doing it "in the heat of battle" is a whole different animal as you are probably aware. Our part 135 check rides actually included an IIMC scenario. I don't know what this guy's training and experience was but most helicopter guys (civilian or military) are reluctant to commit to IIMC. I have plenty of coworkers (military and civilian) that are dead because they could not or did not make the transition from VMC to IMC.

https://streamable.com/cqy8t

https://streamable.com/cqy8t

Maybe. Different helicopters/airplanes have different levels of avionics designed for this. Most complex helicopters/airplanes have a Ground Proximity Warning System (GPWS/EGPWS) pronounced Jipwhizz that warn you when you have a closure rate with terrain or an obstacle. Some aircraft have moving maps and terrain banding that show a map with shaded areas of higher terrain.

None of these help if you have completely lost control of the aircraft as I suspect happened in this incident.

Excellent video. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks...Seems like if you chartered high profile celebs you'd have the best of the best packages more so when you fly an area that has fog
I'm guessing a copilot would have been helpful to bounce things off of
Can you explain what you mean by lost control of the aircraft?
Do mean he thought left was right, up was down or something else?

Thoughts on this article?

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/01/kobe-bryants-helicopter-likely-succumbed-to-common-danger.html

Thanks for posting.

Unlimited amount of avionics available out there with some amazing capabilities, things like you describe do exist.
In aviation the problem is that technology now outpaces the regulatory bodies.  You can't just slap a fancy computer and dash in your aircraft and go fly it for profit.  
Everything has to be designed, tested, and certified in a process that can take years.

The car analogy is that your speedometer is calibrated to be accurate and you cannot just change it because the one you install might not be accurate.  Or it might interfere with another instrument/system.  Or it might need more frequent maintenance than the approved speedometer.

Best package in aviation means many millions of $.  
A second pilot is a huge expense in the civilian world (where profit is the motivator).  Manufacturers go out of their way to produce single pilot aircraft whenever possible to reduce the operating costs(one pilots instead of two).

From my experience being a boat captain and dealing with millionaire owners, all their captains are 'yes' men and not very good captains. Keeping a job is more about how you look, what you say and how you say it than it is about competency.
Sad but true.

I talk to and treat all passengers the same. Whether they be common people or the millionaire owner of the company. No matter how bad shit gets, everyone arrives safely. Bullshit captains take out the bigwigs on nice days.

WX in that area sucks when the marine layer rolls in. Last time I was there, it wouldn't normally burn off until after 1000 local.

A couple pics of VFR over the top near LA.

A copilot would have definitely been helpful, not saying it would have prevented this incident, but having two guys to share the workload makes it more manageable.

Loss of control inflight is hard to explain but an aircraft operates in a three dimensional space. Imagine driving down the road at 70MPH and it starts to rain really hard, so hard you can only see the road markings right in front of you. Then you look down to check the GPS and change the radio station, and when you look back up you are sliding sideways down the road. You have lost control without actively doing anything except neglecting to actively maintain control.

Helicopters are fairly unstable and will pitch/roll if you are not constantly making small corrections. A few seconds of distraction and the aircraft is "upset" or in an "undesirable flight state" without you even knowing it has happened. If you are close to the ground you have little or zero time to correct the undesired flight path.

I'm no pilot, but I have ridden with them a few times. Closest I can relate...

We were flying in a DeHavilland Beaver from western Ontario back towards Winnipeg. A little rough woodland to start but it opens up into farmland pretty quickly. We were flying at around 1,500 feet and about halfway through things got foggy. Our pilot got on the radio...talk, talk, talk...slow left hand bank...retraced about 20 minutes worth of steps and landed, van picked us up and drove us the rest of the way. While we were waiting on the van a couple of us were picking the pilot's brain about the situation. The most poignant thing he said was, "once you get out here you start thinking about flying at 1,000 feet where there are radio towers up to 2,000 feet."

Maybe also something about old pilots and bold pilots. Terrible deal, regardless the circumstances. And bans were earned in the GD, whether they were issued or not.

I am learning a lot about helicopters in this thread.

I never knew that they could not hover in IMC but it makes sense.

And the instability — wow.  In a well trimmed airplane I can take my hand off the yoke and the airplane will remain stable, even correcting itself through bumps.

Listening to the ATC traffic, it sounds a lot like he flew into IMC and lost orientation.  One of his last transmissions to ATC indicated that he was in VFR conditions and following a roadway.  Then there are some transmissions that weren't recorded, but the controller came back and advised that the heli was too low for flight following.

This may suggest that the heli made the transition from 'low visibility' to 'not enough visibility' and the pilot became disoriented.  There was no distress call, just the sad silence of ATC calling the aircraft a few more times with no response......

Could the pilot have changed to IFR flight rules at the time he climbed into the clouds, or is there more to it than that?

Thanks for all the good information guys..
Learning some things here

Based on the interview with the guy above (who seemed relatively knowledgeable) it seems like the pilot was simply disoriented and flew right into the hillside.

That’s called a pop up IFR request.

If ATC does not have radar contact with the aircraft (here he was too low for flight following), they will say “Can you maintain your own terrain and obstruction clearance through X feet.”  If the pilot answers in the affirmative, he is on his own until reaching that altitude.

VFR pilot starting to work on my IFR here, so you IFR guys correct me if I am wrong.

But I hear this call all the time with IFR flights coming out of non-towered fields looking to pick up their IFR flight plan in the air.

Great video. Thanks for posting that.

In on this one

I've been talking to friends who work in that area. It's tough operation they have going on

Can you address the possibility of the pop up IFR question that came up a couple of posts above?

It seems like the fact that they were surrounded by terrain and potentially in IMC would have made that very dangerous.

In this case he's trapped below the layer and unable to hear the controller (likely due to terrain)

If he wasn't the controller would ask if he's capable of IFR flight, give him a squawk code, radar ID him and give him a safe altitude.

In a case like this emergency authority can change some of the rules. It also makes you number one in the sky and I've seen people bend over backwards to make it work

Makes sense. I can see danger in just climbing blindly to get above, but probably equally dangerous to try to hover and become disoriented while you wait on clearance.

"...The Sikorsky S-76B was flying in low clouds and fog, and was operating under "Special VFR" (or Special Visual Flight Rules) status, meaning its pilot had been granted a request to fly in challenging conditions. Such a request is uncommon — but not unusual.... "

"...The pilot's SVFR flight plan called for him to stay clear of clouds and fog, and to navigate by using highways and landmarks as references.

The pilot likely had to file the Special VFR flight plan because the destination, Bryant's sports complex, doesn't have the instrument landing systems that an airport would have to help guide the helicopter to a safe landing.

An aviation weather advisory for Sunday morning had warned pilots that poor visibility would require them to navigate by Instrument Flight Rules — using their cockpit systems to get through clouds.... "

"...According to reports, the pilot was Ara George Zobayan. The FAA database lists him as an instrument-rated commercial pilot licensed to fly helicopters. In addition, he was both a helicopter flight and ground instructor.... "

"...After taking off from Orange County, the aircraft headed northwest over Los Angeles. Then the helicopter briefly circled several times over Glendale, after air traffic controllers asked the pilot to hold in place to let planes land at a nearby airport.

The helicopter eventually continued on in a northwesterly direction and then turned south; soon afterward, it crashed in the mountains near Calabasas.

In the flight's final moments, the helicopter was flying between 120 and 160 knots. The aircraft then started flying faster and descending very rapidly – in excess of 5,000 feet per minute. The last flight data received from the helicopter was at 9:45 a.m., 39 minutes after it took off.... "

https://www.npr.org/2020/01/27/800100632/what-we-know-the-helicopter-crash-that-killed-kobe-bryant-and-8-others

I’m learning a lot in this thread.  Thanks

Oof.

From what I'm hearing SVFR is common out there, no such thing as a SVFR flight plan as it's a clearance through a surface area and no idea what that has with an ils

SVFR is common for r/w. All it means is the airfield is less than VFR conditions. I've taken off many times with 200' and less than 1/2 mile vis, perfectly legal.

Article written by someone that heard something.

SVFR is common in general for helicopters or I should say operating in WX conditions less than 1000/3 is common but in other parts of the country a helicopter would just deviate around controlled airspace. If I were in Kansas I would just fly around MCI or STL rather than trying to going through, but that isn't really an option in when you throw rugged terrain into the mix.

The last part is what I was getting at. Depending on where you live SVFR is common.

OK, yeah SVFR has nothing to do with if a arrival airport/field has an ILS or not.

Like I implied, uneducated (aviation wise) reporter.

ETA As for the last sentence in that article, I would bet on (short of a mechanical failure) spatial disorientation (caused by trying to fly VFR in IMC) and the pilot drove it into the ground.

Star_Scream is an ATC controller.

My $.02 as a low time commercial helicopter pilot follow. My apologies if some of this has already been covered in this topic, I have to admit that I am suffering from an overload of discussion on this particular incident and pretty much just skimmed the thread so far.

I've availed myself of the full limits of the Federal Aviation Regulations (FARs) more than once when it comes to in-flight visibility. That is part of the utility of the helicopter. Unlike fixed wing aircraft, helicopters may be flown in Class G airspace with only 1/2 mile visibility and only need to be clear-of-clouds. Similarly, they are not subject to the fixed wing aircraft 1 mile visibility requirement for an SVFR clearance in controlled airspace (Classes B, C, D and E). Thus:

1. This allows helicopters to go places in weather where a fixed wing aircraft could never go. This important and useful capability is why the FARs allow it.

2. These same places can NOT be reached by a helicopter flying using reference only to instruments (no matter how good your Garmin synthetic vision is). Maybe someday, but not today.

3. The reason that helicopters and helicopter pilots can do this with any degree of safety is because helicopters can fly slowly enough, and low enough (another FAR allowance) so as to (a) be able to turn in time to avoid penetrating IFR conditions only 1/2 mile ahead and (b) land immediately when the situation degrades to the extent that progress cannot be made safely in any direction.

4. In order to be successful in this flight regime, the pilot MUST

(a) Slow down to an appropriate speed so as to be able to react appropriately to impassible IFR conditions ahead.
(b) Be hyper-aware of any obstacles (wires, etc.) and, again, maintain a speed that allows obstacle avoidance if one appears out of the murk only 1/2 mile ahead.
(c) Be prepared to make an immediate, likely steep, turn away from impassible conditions, usually a 180 degree turn to. Stately two minute turns rarely apply in this flight regime.
(d) Fly the helicopter only over terrain where an immediately landing can be made (roads, fields) and NEVER get into unfamiliar terrain (e.g. a bowl or valley) where, if the the backdoor closes up trapping you there with no place to land immediately.
(e) Never, ever, EVER lose sight of the ground.
(f) Be prepared to throw in the towel and land immediately, or divert appropriately if possible. You paid your money, you took your chances. If someone has to drive three hours to get you and three hours back in a couple of days to recover the helicopter so be it. Better "too bad" than "so sad".

This is much easier to do with two people, of course. It can and does take all one's attention watching the front door. Someone else to watch the backdoor, do the nav., comm's, monitor engine instruments, etc., continuously check weather, etc., is unbelievably helpful.

This tool is quite wonderful (not perfect, of course) for making go/no-go conditions with respect to SFVR/low visibility flights: https://www.aviationweather.gov/hemst

All that said, some people are not ready to explore this flight regime. Others may question its utility. Others may question its sanity. Nevertheless, this flight regime is an important part of the helicopter world. The same can be said of helicopter offshore flight, or helicopter high altitude mountain operations, shipboard operations, even fair rides or tours in Kauai. Your personal limits are yours. The helicopter world is way more complex than simply flying paved runway to paved runway, which why it takes a different kind of pilot to inhabit it

And with that we turn to conjecture. From my read of the available data, this pilot was operating within this flight regime at a speed far too high to be safe and successful, 130KN and higher. And the turn at the end looks all too much like a safe, sedate, stately, on-instruments turn. He probably penetrated into solid IFR conditions so fast he was not ready for it, performed the only maneuver he could at that point, a climbing 180 degree turn on instruments, and nevertheless either lost control or impacted rising terrain. He was an IFR rated pilot in a nicely equipped aircraft, so I suspect control was not lost, it was all just too little, too late, at too high a speed. One wonders if a VFR rated pilot in slower helicopter rather than a speedy S-76 might not have avoided this ending by being inherently slower and more cautious.

Of course that is all conjecture. It could have been anything from a drone collision to an catastrophic failure of the helicopter. Could have been, but unlikely. Time, and the NTSB, will tell.

There are plenty of fixed wing aircraft that aren’t like that though...most of the fun ones in fact, which is in part what makes them fun :-)

And maybe someday I will get to fly and experience one!

To clarify a bit, the first part of your comment constitutes a pop up IFR clearance where there's no previous flight plan filed.  Subject to workload.  (a controller may ask you to file an IFR flight plan with flight service for SAR purposes)

Flights out of non-towered airports picking their clearance up in the air have likely already filed an IFR flight plan.

If I need correction, anyone feel free to correct me.. I'm a VERY non-current IFR pilot:D

The pilot continued VFR flight in rapidly deteriorating visibility with rising, channeling terrain.

The pilot went inadvertent IMC at a speed where it would have been impossible to have avoided out flying his visibility and either crashed into the rising and channeling terrain trying (and failing) to maintain aircraft control while attempting to climb to altitude where he could declare an emergency and request an IFR clearance or crashed while trying to foolishly turn and descend out of IMC (what I actually suspect happened).

There is no way that this entire incident was not 100% avoidable with reasonable experience and judgement.

That said, due to the ceilings and vis enroute, there is no way that the pilot could have transitioned to IFR, mid-flight, without declaring an emergency and likely getting violated and subsequently fired.  He was too low to be issued an IFR clearance and had not filed an IFR flight plan. Asking ATC for a pop up IFR clearance is one thing.  Getting it is another.

He would not have completed the charter if he filed IFR prior to departure and obtained a clearance.  IFR gets you from an IFR airport to an IFR airport, not where the customer wanted to go.

Autopilots are not life saving devices.  Never try to couple to one to recover control in an emergency flight regime.  Fly the aircraft to a sustainable condition and then, within constraints and with forethought couple up as necessary to make things easier.  Trying to use an autopilot to save your life is just making the autopilot kill you instead of you killing you.

This tragedy became fatal before the pilot went IIMC.  He just didn’t realize it.  There’s a saying that an old timer told me decades ago and I have passed on whenever I could.  "By the time you start thinking ‘This is fucking stupid’ it’s already been stupid for at least 10 minutes."   I wish the pilot had realized that.

No. You are right. I did not adequately distinguish between the two — pop up (request IFR flight plan in the air) and departing non-towered field on IFR plan (previously filed before takeoff). Thanks for the clarification.

Which begs the question can you request a pop-up IFR flight plan when you are in radio communication with ATC but not on their radar yet?

I love that aviation quote and try to remember it always when in the air.

So what I just realized and is interesting is that they needed to go VFR or SVFR to land in a parking lot somewhere. And IFR flight plan can’t get them from an airport to a parking lot. Very obvious but something I didn’t consider. I don’t land in parking lots, at least not on purpose (knocks on wood — @samuse what were you saying about luck...?).