To watch compelling video taken from the KPNX chopper of the accident, CLICK HERE
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It was bound to happen at some point - and today, it did... two news helicopters covering a police chase collided in mid air and crashed in Phoenix, Arizona, this afternoon.
Our Gannett sister station KPNX (which did not have one of the two choppers involved in the accident) reports both the pilots and photographers on each of the two aircraft died when the helicopters collided over Steele Indian School Park. The helicopters, as well as those from other stations, were covering a police chase at the time.There did not appear to be any casualties on the ground.
Channel 15, the local ABC affiliate, reported that pilot Craig Smith and photographer Rick Krolak were on board their aircraft. Channel 3, the an independent station, reported that pilot Scott Bowerbank and photographer Jim Cox were on their aircraft.
For the latest information on this story, we refer you to the KPNX website: CLICK HERE
Courtesy: KPNX and Azcentral.com
2 comments:
Is that surprising~~~!News people chasing stories and inteferring with police work!!! I mourn for thier families but detest their thirst for sesational stories at the expense of lives!!
First off, my heart goes out to the victims of the crash and their families and the entire Phoenix TV news community. My thoughts and prayers are with them all.
Second, in reply to the first comment by "Anonymous" - hope you didn't pull a muscle jumping to the conclusion that the "news people" were "inteferring (sic) with police work". All the news crews covering the police chase were doing their jobs. One of the cornerstones of working in news is to observe, to record, to report - but not to become part of the story. The police got their suspect in the chase, according to local media reports. Sadly, two news choppers collided and resulted in four deaths. Before coming to a knee-jerk theory that the coverage of the police chase in Phoenix disrupted the chase, please try to back it up with some facts. These were veteran, professional journalists doing their jobs -- not reckless paparazzi chasing around celebs.
Third and finally, I'm reading that the person arrested in the chase may face murder charges in the deaths of the four who perished in the helicopter crash. I don't know if I agree with this, though. I think it's kind of a legal "leap" that is shaky at best. Granted, the helicopters were there as a result of the police chase the suspect allegedly touched off. But the crash was at the periphery of the central event, the police chase. If there's any culpability or accountability to be had, it should follow from the findings the NTSB digs up. The way I see it, the helicopter crash happened as a peripheral event related to the police chase. I think it will be difficult to establish causality between the chase suspect's actions and the crash of the news helicopters. If a court ends up convicting the suspect of murder in the helicopter crash, it wouldn't surprise me at all to see it reversed on appeal.
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