TMZ reporting the passing of Kobe Bryant

[TheRainMaker]

I’m guessing there was a malfunction somewhere. The pilot turning so aggressively and then nose diving into the hills at 184 mph just seems bizarre.

 

[ViperGTS]

I’m guessing there was a malfunction somewhere. The pilot turning so aggressively and then nose diving into the hills at 184 mph just seems bizarre.

In the aviation community it is called spacial disorientation. It generally happens when you lose sight of the horizon. It could be sunset, sunrise or clouds. Clouds are generally the culprit. It is based on physiology and the inner ear. Since you are in forward motion with no clear reference of the horizon your mind thinks one thing and you feel another. Meaning you could swear you are in a left turn, when in reality you are in a right turn.

This was I believe an F16 guy who had zero idea what was up left right or down.
https://youtu.be/HAaeBE7uSzY



It is scary and it is lethal.

 

[TheRainMaker]

In the aviation community it is called spacial disorientation. It generally happens when you lose sight of the horizon. It could be sunset, sunrise or clouds. Clouds are generally the culprit. It is based on physiology and the inner ear. Since you are in forward motion with no clear reference of the horizon your mind thinks one thing and you feel another. Meaning you could swear you are in a left turn, when in reality you are in a right turn.

This was I believe an F16 guy who had zero idea what was up left right or down.



It is scary and it is lethal.

Wow!

 

[TheBostonStraggler]

Example of potential spatial disorientation from 2011:

Two crewmembers and five passengers aboard a Sikorsky S-92 operated in IMC by Cougar Helicopters were only 38 feet above the waters of the Atlantic Ocean when the pilot, having suffered a bout of spatial disorientation, regained control of the helicopter, according to a September 12 report from Canada’s Transportation Safety Board. The incident occurred on July 23, 2011, 217 miles southeast of St. John’s, Newfoundland.

During the IMC departure procedure from the Sea Rose oil platform, the captain made a large, rapid aft cyclic input just before the cyclic trim button was released and the autopilot’s go-around mode engaged. This caused the helicopter to enter a nose-high, decelerating pitch attitude that neither pilot noticed, possibly due to brightening within the ****pit that they interpreted as clear skies just above.

The airspeed of the helicopter continued to decrease, eventually to within 5 knots of the minimum control speed in instrument meteorological conditions (VMINI) when the captain momentarily pressed the cyclic force trim release button and made an aft cyclic input. This caused the helicopter’s airspeed to decrease below VMINI, and the helicopter to enter a 23-degree nose-high attitude followed by a descent toward the water.

“The captain, subtly incapacitated possibly due to spatial disorientation, did not lower the nose of the helicopter and apply collective to recover from the nose-high attitude,” concluded the report. “This contributed to the excessive amount of altitude that was lost during the inadvertent descent.”

The helicopter broke out of the clouds at 200 feet above sea level as full power was added to both engines, over-torquing both. The crew did not regain full control until the aircraft was 38 feet above sea level.

The helicopter eventually landed safely at St. John’s.

 

[festy1986]

My old plane we had a “*****ing betty” terrain warning system. “Terrain terrain, pull up, pull up.” Half the time we would turn the audio off because she thought we were always going to crash. In this instance it probably would not have helped and helos operate low as a rule anyways. Nope, he should have just stopped and figured things out.

The low terrain was to his right and he went left. He got confused.

My question is, why would the pilot continue to be at speeds of over 180mph when apparently it only takes 15mph to maintain a hover.

Why not wait it out, especially if it's true that he most certainly would of seen the hillside they only missed by a 100 feet.

Just literally a series of unfortunate events.

 

[festy1986]

Example of potential spatial disorientation from 2011:

Two crewmembers and five passengers aboard a Sikorsky S-92 operated in IMC by Cougar Helicopters were only 38 feet above the waters of the Atlantic Ocean when the pilot, having suffered a bout of spatial disorientation, regained control of the helicopter, according to a September 12 report from Canada’s Transportation Safety Board. The incident occurred on July 23, 2011, 217 miles southeast of St. John’s, Newfoundland.

During the IMC departure procedure from the Sea Rose oil platform, the captain made a large, rapid aft cyclic input just before the cyclic trim button was released and the autopilot’s go-around mode engaged. This caused the helicopter to enter a nose-high, decelerating pitch attitude that neither pilot noticed, possibly due to brightening within the ****pit that they interpreted as clear skies just above.

The airspeed of the helicopter continued to decrease, eventually to within 5 knots of the minimum control speed in instrument meteorological conditions (VMINI) when the captain momentarily pressed the cyclic force trim release button and made an aft cyclic input. This caused the helicopter’s airspeed to decrease below VMINI, and the helicopter to enter a 23-degree nose-high attitude followed by a descent toward the water.

“The captain, subtly incapacitated possibly due to spatial disorientation, did not lower the nose of the helicopter and apply collective to recover from the nose-high attitude,” concluded the report. “This contributed to the excessive amount of altitude that was lost during the inadvertent descent.”

The helicopter broke out of the clouds at 200 feet above sea level as full power was added to both engines, over-torquing both. The crew did not regain full control until the aircraft was 38 feet above sea level.

The helicopter eventually landed safely at St. John’s.

But I doubt it was nearly as foggy then than it was for kobe flight

And 200 feet without a doubt appears to be way more room to work with than this helicopter had to fix things, especially given the chances that he never knew there was any real trouble.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

Well in the military we operated fixed wing down at 2-300 agl at night on NVGs. Of course had terrain mapping radar and FLIR to help us along. Even then a mistake made 5 miles before a ridgeline it would have been game over. There were times I wished I was in a helo since you can just throw it into a hover fairly quickly and not slam into a mountain.

Funny story. We were up in Alaska for an exercise. It was dark, and I mean dark up in the mountains. We were down in a valley and the valley curved to the right. As we were coming up to the turn, I called out a climb to clear terrain. It had been pre briefed but the pilots forgot I guess. I called it again and finally in the turn we started climbing. As we got further a land bridge type of terrain was right there. Had we stayed at our current altitude we would have flew right into it. Thank god for satellite imagery and route study that was pounded into our brains.

I can only imagine all the stuff you helo guys have to watch out for. Power lines probably being at the top.

Right and helicopters are for the most part perfectly safe operating down near the terrain. Hell, that’s basically why they operate. Places where you can’t get an airplane- like around mountains. So a *****ing Betty telling me I’m around mountains all the time will probably not be helpful. I fly planes and I would never think of taking a plane as low as I take a helicopter but obviously it’s a lot more dangerous to be that low in a plane. On the other hand if I’m in the clouds I much prefer an airplane.
Flying low at night in a plane in the mountains sounds suicidal. Some things are safer in helicopters and some things are not.

 

[festy1986]

Kobe Bryant death: Nearby door cams capture noise of fatal helicopter crash

According to this, the helicopter fell for over a minute before impact.

I'm still not sure if that was on purpose or if this helicopter was falling because it hit part of the hillside.

I guess I just wanna take comfort in known they never knew it was coming but on the other hand I wanna believe the pilot had a minute to solve this issue and was just paralyzed by how much time and distractions he would no doubt of had.

Hard to move on, cant imagine what it's like for all families involved.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

My question is, why would the pilot continue to be at speeds of over 180mph when apparently it only takes 15mph to maintain a hover.

Why not wait it out, especially if it's true that he most certainly would of seen the hillside they only missed by a 100 feet.

Just literally a series of unfortunate events.

I think the 180 is at the end. Essentially the speed he was falling from the sky.

 

[festy1986]

I think the 180 is at the end. Essentially the speed he was falling from the sky.

So they're coming to the conclusion that they were falling and not flying?

I did read somewhere that they believe they hit hillside but I also read other stuff.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

So they're coming to the conclusion that they were falling and not flying?

I did read somewhere that they believe they hit hillside but I also read other stuff.

From what I know of this helicopter it cannot fly that speed unless it’s in a dive. Especially with how heavy it was. The data I saw had them flying a little over 115 most of the flight until at the end the speed spiked in a dive. But that’s not extremely fast. However I would not fly that speed in poor weather. Like you said an obvious advantage in a helo is the ability to fly slow. Or if the weather looks like crap simply stop.

I think a little bit of sensationalism is going on with how the media is reporting the fall. First of all 2,000 feet per minute is not extremely fast. In fact you probably descent at that rate when you are flying on most airlines. It would not necessarily be obvious to the passengers they were “falling.” That is descending 26mph. Imagine how much g-force you feel accelerating to 26mph. Not a whole lot even if you accelerate quickly. A skydiver falls somewhere around 12,000 FPM- so 2,000 isn’t exactly free falling.

Also they say they descended 1200 feet at the end from their highest altitude before they hit. Obviously if you fall at 2000 FPM for one minute you will have descended 2,000 feet, not 1200. So the descent rate acceleration was somewhat gradual to make that math work.

I can’t say for sure but from the numbers I don’t necessarily think it would have been obvious to the passengers anything was wrong.

One spatial disorientation illusion is the feeling of climbing in a turn. In a turn g-forces push you into your seat, just as they do in a climb. Because of this in a turn a pilot who can’t see outside (or isn’t looking at instruments) may feel like he’s in a climb, and correct by descending unintentionally. Essentially making it “feel” the aircraft is not climbing. Something like this may be why the pilot descended in the turn. And if so the passengers likely also didn’t “feel” they were descending either.

 

[ViperGTS]

So they're coming to the conclusion that they were falling and not flying?

I did read somewhere that they believe they hit hillside but I also read other stuff.

Falling would indicate a stall, which is possible if he panicked a bit and stall out the rotor blades. He wasn’t high enough for density altitude to be an issue so thats the only possibility. Also I saw your above post and there is no way it was a minute based on aircraft height and terrain height. More like 15 seconds and as I said earlier the last 10 were probably hell as the realization sunk in. The impact, well nobody knows if there was any pain but all we can go by is instant lights out as our best guess.

I kinda know how time slows down a bit once over Ft. Bragg in N.C and then again out somewhereville Albuquerque. It is a real thing. Seconds feel like minutes.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

In the aviation community it is called spacial disorientation. It generally happens when you lose sight of the horizon. It could be sunset, sunrise or clouds. Clouds are generally the culprit. It is based on physiology and the inner ear. Since you are in forward motion with no clear reference of the horizon your mind thinks one thing and you feel another. Meaning you could swear you are in a left turn, when in reality you are in a right turn.

This was I believe an F16 guy who had zero idea what was up left right or down.



It is scary and it is lethal.

There was a helicopter in Florida that accidentally started flying backwards over the water. They did not realize it.

 

[ViperGTS]

There was a helicopter in Florida that accidentally started flying backwards over the water. They did not realize it.

People don’t think the inner ear be like it is, but it do.

 

[Drewski]

In the aviation community it is called spacial disorientation. It generally happens when you lose sight of the horizon. It could be sunset, sunrise or clouds. Clouds are generally the culprit. It is based on physiology and the inner ear. Since you are in forward motion with no clear reference of the horizon your mind thinks one thing and you feel another. Meaning you could swear you are in a left turn, when in reality you are in a right turn.

This was I believe an F16 guy who had zero idea what was up left right or down.



It is scary and it is lethal.

Holy Hell. I have obviously heard of this before; the ear and mind playing tricks. But it is quite another thing to see trained/training professionals encounter it on "film".

I have the intestinal fortitude of a newborn when it comes to heights. While I painted using 30/60 foot extension ladders in college, going up 12 feet now to put one of our XMas trees up above our front door is about all my nerves can handle anymore. I flew a ton as kid living overseas, but I have lost my love of being in a metal tube, 6 or 7 miles up traveling 80% of the speed of sound.

This would have been me in that ****pit. Sound warning for people in offices.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

I read the operator was not certified IFR for 135 operations.

 

[203Pat]

I was never a big Kobe fan as he was a Laker and I dislike all things Laker. At the same time I respected his talent and drive and the fact that he was able to win with, and without Shaq. He was the last of a dying breed. The main reason I barely watch the NBA anymore is because of this new breed of "stars". Mentally soft, need to be coddled, and cannot take any sort of coaching or criticism. The burner accounts on Twitter to defend themselves from random nobodies, the politicking amongst other players to create the super teams, the fact that acts that were barely a foul 30 years ago are now a flagrant. I really cant think of any current NBA player anywhere near Kobe's level with the old school mentality Kobe played with.

 

[Clonamery]

I read the operator was not certified IFR for 135 operations.

That is interesting.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

In my opinion this is the problem though. A perfect pilot would have avoided this accident. And no doubt the perfection of this pilot avoided many accidents. But when we’re talking passengers perfection shouldn’t be what’s required. If the safety of the passengers requires one guy being perfect than its lacking in my opinion.

This is not a comment on this accident, only a reflection on some previous accidents.

Safety doesn't go by how good you are, as if piloting is a moral quality. It goes by what you do that specific day. Safety is about defeating a rare occurrence, remaining aware that the rare occurrence can occur, even though it hasn't the last 1,000 times.

You can take a reckless chance 1 time and pay the price, even if you did the right thing the last 1,000 times. And again, THIS IS NOT ABOUT THIS ACCIDENT/PILOT.

I am just saying we get this idea of the "perfect pilot" and a lot of people think it means what a brilliant guy he is, how great his hand flying skills are, maybe something about his reaction time... but a great deal of being "perfect" means doing the right thing this time... every time.

To Bob's point - we shouldn't be looking for more perfection as a sort of inherent trait, but we should enthusiastically encourage procedural compliance, and procedures that make sense to comply with. Even better, design out as many opportunities for failure as possible... alerting/alarming when failure is imminent... finding ways that imperfect people can be perfect with a little help (because human beings will make errors.)

Again, these are one man's opinions IN GENERAL about safety, NOT about this accident, because I DO NOT KNOW WHAT HAPPENED YET.

 

[PatsFanInVa]

Neither of the two suggestions by the NTSB would have prevented this accident based on what they’ve said so far.

Hold on, they have issued recommendations on this accident already?