NBA Legend Kobe Bryant Killed In Helicopter Crash

UPDATE: 5:54 p.m. ET: Minutes ago at a press conference about the incident, Calabasas government officials confirmed that nine people died in the helicopter crash — not five, as had been previously reported.

One of those nine that has been confirmed was Orange Coast College head baseball coach John Altobelli, an extremely popular and well known coach in the college ranks nationally, who was reportedly traveling to his daughter’s basketball game along with Kobe and Gianna. Just awful.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the Bryant and Altobelli families, and whoever else was involved in this horrible tragedy.

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UPDATE: 4:26 p.m. ET: New reports are coming to light indicating another player on GiGi’s basketball team, and that player’s parent, were also killed in the helicopter crash today in Calabasas.

Sources: Kobe Bryant was on his way to a travel basketball game with his daughter Gianna when the helicopter crashed. Those aboard the helicopter also included another player and parent.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) January 26, 2020

Very, very sad.

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UPDATE: 3:48 p.m. ET: TMZ is now reporting Kobe’s 13-year-old daughter Gianna Maria was also on the helicopter, and has passed away as well.

Oh, no…

GiGi, as she was known, was an up-and-coming talented young basketball player herself as a teenager. According to the report, Kobe and GiGi were on their way to the Mamba Academy for a basketball practice in nearby Thousand Oaks, California when the crash occurred in Calabasas.

Just awful, awful news to report. This is terrible.

RIP to Kobe, GiGi, and the others who perished in this accident. We can’t even imagine what family, friends, and loved ones are going through right now.

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Recently retired NBA superstar Kobe Bryant has passed away.

According to TMZ, he was killed in a helicopter crash along with several other people on Sunday morning in Calabasas, California. Bryant was 41 years old at the time of his death. So, so unbelievably sad…

According to reports from the scene, there were at least three other people in Kobe’s private helicopter at the time it crashed on Sunday morning. A fire broke out, and emergency personnel responded, but nobody on board survived. As expected, the cause of the crash is already under investigation by aviation authorities on scene.

Early on at least five people have been confirmed dead in the crash by multiple reports, though it’s unclear now whether that number may change. Media outlets are reporting that his wife Vanessa was not among those on board, though obviously it’s still unclear exactly who is among the others deceased. The only thing that has definitively been confirmed from first responders on scene, per TMZ, is that there were no survivors from the crash.

Calabasas mayor Alicia Weintraub released a statement about the crash to the media within the last hour, too. NBC Los Angeles reports she said (below):

“It is with great sadness that we learn of the death of Kobe Bryant and four others in a helicopter crash in Calabasas. The aircraft went down in a remote field off Las Virgenes [Road] around 10:00 this morning. Nobody on the ground was hurt.”

CNN is reporting that “several bicyclists” heard the engines of a helicopter sputtering, and saw the helicopter in distress moments before it went down.

We’ll continue to update you with more information about the Los Angeles Lakers‘ legends tragic passing as soon as we receive it throughout the day.