Kobe Bryant’s pilot was employed by a company that is legally not allowed to have its pilots fly in bad weather conditions, according to multiple sources.
Ara Zobayan, 50, was licensed to fly in low visibility, but the charter company he worked for was not certified, sources told the New York Times on Thursday. The revelation calls into question whether Zobayan was flying legally when the helicopter went down Sunday, killing him and eight other people, including Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna.
Claudia Lowry, an owner of a charter service based in the same airport as the charter company Kobe’s pilot used, said that Zobayan’s company was not certified to fly in bad conditions. “It’s not worth it, we don’t fly in that kind of weather anyway,” Lowry said. “And most of the time, the weather is good.”
A second source confirmed Kobe’s pilot could not fly legally in bad weather conditions. The National Transportation Safety Board is looking into the company’s certification in the wake of the crash.
“We take a broad look at everything in an investigation — man, machine, and the environment,” a representative for the NTSB said earlier this week. “And weather is just a small portion of that.”
Zobayan said he was trying to get above the clouds moments before the helicopter slammed into the side of a mountain at 185 mph. There was fog that day that had grounded the Los Angeles Police Department and the local sheriff’s department.
