NBC L.A. News Helicopter Crashed While Covering a Deadly Collision — Then Audio From Its Final Seconds Surfaced

The helicopter was already descending when a voice from inside asked the question that would later haunt people who heard the recording: “What? You can’t pull up?” Seconds later, the aerial footage jolted violently and ended. On the evening of September 15, 2026, NewsChopper 4 had been flying above Chatsworth, Los Angeles, covering the aftermath of a deadly Metro bus collision when the aircraft itself went down near a self-storage facility shortly before 7 p.m. Aerial photojournalist Eliana “Eli” Moreno and pilot George Marciniw were aboard. Authorities said three people died at the helicopter crash scene, including what officials initially described as a person apparently on the ground. Firefighters already working nearby rushed toward the wreckage and found the aircraft engulfed in flames, with fire spreading to surrounding vehicles. What had begun as coverage of one tragedy had suddenly become another.

Moreno and Marciniw were familiar figures in Southern California aerial news. Moreno, an Orange County native and Chapman University graduate, had worked in helicopter journalism since 2010 and later became known to viewers of NBC4 and Telemundo 52. Marciniw was an experienced helicopter pilot whose career included aerial filming, flight instruction, surveillance, ferry work, and aircraft management. Their colleagues struggled to process the news on air after NBC Los Angeles confirmed the crash. Anchor Colleen Williams told viewers the station had lost contact with its crew before learning that NewsChopper 4 had gone down, while colleagues later described Moreno and Marciniw as people who loved breaking news and loved working from the helicopter. Only hours earlier, the crew had been documenting another emergency on Nordhoff Street, where a collision involving a Metro bus and passenger vehicle had already killed two people and injured others.

Witness Zareh Sevanesian said he noticed the helicopter behaving strangely as he drove nearby with his wife. He recalled thinking that it did not appear to be flying properly and watching it lose altitude before the crash. Video circulating afterward appeared to show the same unsettling descent, with the aircraft’s movement becoming increasingly erratic before the feed stopped. The brief question heard from inside the helicopter quickly became the most discussed portion of the recording, but the footage alone could not establish why the aircraft went down. Veteran helicopter pilot and former news reporter Zoey Tur publicly suggested that sounds in the recording were consistent with an engine problem and a low-rotor-RPM warning, but that remained an outside assessment rather than an official finding. The significance of those sounds would have to be determined from physical evidence, flight information, aircraft systems, and the broader sequence reconstructed by investigators.

The National Transportation Safety Board opened an investigation into the September 15 crash of the Eurocopter AS 350 B2, with investigators expected to examine the wreckage, aircraft condition, operating history, and circumstances of the flight. The Federal Aviation Administration also became involved on the regulatory side, including matters of certification, records, and operational compliance. Those processes are deliberately methodical, and neither agency had established an official cause in the material available immediately after the crash. For the families involved, that distinction mattered: a dramatic final recording can show what people experienced without explaining what mechanically or operationally produced it. Investigators would need to determine whether any apparent loss of power, rotor condition, flight-control issue, or other factor actually contributed—and whether multiple events occurred in sequence.

Away from the investigation, Moreno’s ordinary life suddenly carried a different weight. Her social media showed an engaged woman who spoke several languages, cared for chickens, loved dogs, and had spent years building a career above Southern California. One cheerful post written only days before the crash had nothing to do with danger or aviation; afterward, people returned to it simply because it was among the last public traces she left behind. Marciniw, too, was remembered by friends as a veteran pilot and longtime figure in the local aviation community. The final seconds from NewsChopper 4 are difficult precisely because they offer so little certainty: a descending aircraft, a frightened question, violent movement, then silence. The investigation may eventually explain the mechanics. For the people who knew those aboard, however, the harder fact had already arrived—the flight they expected to come home from never did.