Late on Sunday, the world was shocked to find out about the tragic death of NBA legend Kobe Bryant.

Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter, and seven other people died when the helicopter carrying them crashed in Calabasas, just outside of Los Angeles.

You can read more about the final moments leading up to the crash here.

News outlets around the world rushed to put together obituaries and video segments featuring Bryant, but not all of them did their due diligence.

After all, Kobe is one of the most recognisable sportsmen in the world, as is fellow NBA star, LeBron James.

Enter the BBC, and this on-air gaffe of pretty epic proportions:

I genuinely cannot believe that the actual BBC News at 10 just did this pic.twitter.com/n6csMV9OOG

— Matthew Champion (@matthewchampion) January 26, 2020

You really don’t have to a sports nut to see that they’ve used plenty of footage of LeBron in that segment, instead of Kobe.

This from the Washington Post:

Paul Royall, who edits the BBC’s “News at Six” and “News at Ten,” tweeted an apology Sunday, calling the mistake “human error.”

“In tonight’s coverage of the death of Kobe Bryant on #BBCNewsTen we mistakenly used pictures of LeBron James in one section of the report. We apologise for this human error which fell below our usual standards on the programme,” he wrote.

There was also an on-air apology for the mix-up from newsreader Reeta Chakrabarti, who said, “In our coverage of the death of Kobe Bryant, in one section of the report, we mistakenly showed pictures of another basketball player, LeBron James.

“We do apologize for the error,” she said.

Mistakes happen, but this was a pretty shoddy one.

In some of the shots, you can even see James’ name on the back of his jersey.

Not the BBC’s finest moment, by any stretch of the imagination.

[source:washpost]