Doug Semler writes:

I was reading one of the stories and it said the reporter was the
pilot? I would think that would make it even MORE difficult to "see
and avoid..."

There was a crew of two in each aircraft, pilot and journalist. However, some
news helicopter pilots do double as journalists; I don't know to what extent
that may have been true here. Clearly, the pilots were not spending enough
time on the piloting task in any case.