Chopper Sky Kings Attain Immortality A memorial was unveiled Sunday in Phoenix, Arizona, to four men

July 27, 2007, was a Phoenix TV programmer's gift from heaven: a police chase of a stolen pickup truck, on a Friday, during peak lunch hour viewing time. The cops followed the vehicle through the streets of the city for over 40 minutes, and five different local TV station choppers followed as well, feeding live video to their viewers. The police had its own helicopter, adding to the congestion.
Something was bound to happen, and it did. The Channel 15 helicopter flew into the Channel 3 helicopter and they crashed in a fiery heap onto the lawn of a local park. Both pilots and both cameramen were killed.
One year later to the day, a concrete memorial with pictures of all four casualties -- Craig Smith, Rick Krolak, Scott Bowerbank, and Jim Cox -- was dedicated about 50 feet from the crash site. At the ceremony, a father of one of the reporters last minute discount vacation packages asked, "Why do we have to send five helicopters up to cover a non-newsworthy event?" But another local news chopper pilot declared that, "Given another chance at life, they would do exactly what they were doing."
Chopper Sky Kings Attain Immortality A memorial was unveiled Sunday in Phoenix, Arizona, to four men who died exactly one year earlier when their news choppers collided while broadcasting a police chase of a stolen pickup truck.
Trip Planning Caution : RoadsideAmerica.com offers maps, directions and tourist attraction details as a convenience to our users, providing all information as is. Attraction status, hours and prices can change without notice, so call ahead before driving 100 miles and ruining your day.