Twitter was down Sunday after news broke that basketball legend Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, California, alongside his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others. As fans took to social media to react to the news and pay their respects, many reported issues accessing the site, receiving error messages that read “Something went wrong, but don’t fret – it’s not your fault” and “Twitter is over capacity. Please wait a few moments then try again.”
According to Down Detector, the disruption affected users across the globe, though widespread outages were reported in the United States beginning just after noon and continuing throughout the evening.
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Users reported trouble logging in, scrolling through the site, and a complete crash of the “trending” page.
trending page is down. kobe’s death has crashed twitter. celebs please start flying commercial ffs your helicopters are tiny lil private planes ARE NOT SAFE pic.twitter.com/dzPfvt4ScF
— CØDY (@_codez) January 26, 2020
“It’s crashed again, right after Gianna was confirmed to be one of the five killed :(- today sucks,” one person wrote.
“Twitter is down because there are so many frickin Kobe tweets being sent at once,” reported another user.
“Kobe broke the Internet,” commented a third.
Twitter is Broken right now with the News that Kobe has died in a Helicopter Crash. Hopefully this isn’t real but it definitely seems to be. pic.twitter.com/oe98lwApXj
— Larkside Radio (@LarksideRadio) January 26, 2020
Reports of issues with the sight slowly dwindled throughout the night, dropping from nearly 1,000 to less than a dozen by the early hours of Monday morning.
Bryant, who retired from the NBA in 2016, his daughter Gianna, and seven others were on their way to the Mamba Sports Academy for basketball practice when his Sikorsky S-76B helicopter went down just before 10 a.m. PT. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department later confirmed that there were no survivors.
At this time, is unclear what caused the crash, though foggy weather conditions were reported at the time. Those who witnessed the crash also reported hearing the engine sputtering, suggesting a possible mechanical problem. An investigation into the crash is currently underway.
Along with Bryant and his daughter, family members have said that Orange Coast college baseball coach John Altobelli, his wife Keri Altobelli, and daughter Alyssa Altobelli also died in the crash. Girls basketball coach Christina Mauser is also said to have been among the victims.
