Beloved owner of Leicester City leaves legacy of generosity

BANGKOK - Thai billionaire and Leicester City owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha died when his helicopter crashed in a parking lot next to the soccer club's stadium on Saturday.

He was 60.

Vichai was known to fans as a smiling, benevolent man who gave away free beers and hot dogs on his birthday and brought the club its fairytale English Premier League title in 2016.

The business world remembers Vichai as the retail entrepreneur who started with one shop and grew Thailand's massive King Power duty-free chain.

The sight of his personal helicopter taking off from the middle of the pitch - to take Vichai to his English base near London in Berkshire - was a regular feature after Leicester's home games.

On Saturday evening, it turned into a horror scene when the chopper appeared to suddenly lose power, plummeting to the ground in a parking lot outside the empty stadium and bursting into flames.

The crash sparked emotional scenes in Leicester, the East Midlands city whose devoted soccer fans will forever be grateful to Vichai for bankrolling not only the club's first title in the world's top league, but one of the most incredible stories in global sports history.

Leicester, only two years after being promoted from England's second-tier league, was a 5,000-to-1 shot to win the Premier League at the start of the 2015-16 season. But after Vichai brought in veteran Italian manager Claudio Ranieri at the start of the campaign, the Foxes produced a stunning season.