Various 911 calls from people in Los Angeles who witnessed Kobe Bryant‘s helicopter crash last Sunday have been released. The Los Angeles Fire Department released the audio of callers who either heard or saw the aircraft crash into the hilly terrain in Calabasas around 9:45 a.m. on Jan. 26.
In audio published by ABC15, one caller was walking on a trail when he heard the Sikorsky S-76 helicopter go down above him, mistaking it for a plane. “I can hear this plane, I think it was in the clouds,” he told the 911 dispatcher, according to the recording. “We couldn’t see it — and then we just heard a boom, and a dead sound. Then I can see the flames.”
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Another caller, who was at a nearby supermarket in Agoura Hills, told dispatchers that a “helicopter crashed into a mountain.”
“We heard it, and I’m now looking at the flames,” the man said from about a quarter-mile away from the crash site.
Another caller said he didn’t see the crash but became concerned by a sudden silence after the chopper flew overhead. “I just heard a helicopter go over me,” he said. “It went over my heard, it is thick in the clouds and then I heard a pop and it immediately stopped.”
Someone else called reporting a hillside fire but was unaware of any crash. One more caller reported smoke and flames.
In total, the fire department released five calls pertaining to the crash that killed Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and the seven other people on board. The pilot, Ara Zobayan, had been attempting to get the aircraft out of the clouds, when the chartered helicopter went into a sudden 1,200-foot descent that lasted nearly a minute. It slammed into a fog-shrouded hillside, scattering debris more than 500 feet.
Air traffic controllers had given Zobayan Special Visual Flight Rules (SVFR) or clearance to fly in less-than-optimal weather around the Burbank airport. He was told to follow a freeway and to stay at or below 2,500 feet. Under SVFR, pilots are allowed to fly in weather conditions worse than those allowed for Visual Flight Rules (VFR).
Following the crash, it has been revealed the helicopter was not equipped with safety tools that are standard on planes, such as a terrain awareness and warning system (TAWS), a cockpit voice recorder (CVR), flight data recorders (FDR) or black boxes.
The crash was officially ruled an accident by the LA County Coroner, but investigators are still looking into what exactly caused the helicopter to plummet over 2,000 feet per minute.
The company that owned the Sikorsky aircraft, Island Express Helicopters, temporarily suspended its operations last week following the crash. “The shock of the accident affected all staff, and management decided that service would be suspended until such time as it was deemed appropriate for staff and customers,” the statement read. A representative told PEOPLE that that the company suspended flight services for Thursday and Friday.
