US figure skaters on board plane that crashed into Potomac River

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. skating community was in mourning on Thursday after learning several skaters were on an American Airlines regional passenger plane that crashed near Reagan Washington National Airport. 

The plane, with 64 passengers and crew, was en route on Wednesday to Washington from Wichita, Kansas, when it was involved in a mid-air collision with a U.S. Army helicopter.

The sport's national governing body said athletes, coaches and family members were returning from the National Development Camp held in conjunction with the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, held this year in Kansas.

"We are devastated by this unspeakable tragedy and hold the victims’ families closely in our hearts," it said in a statement.

The exact number of people on board who were involved in figure skating, or had a family member who was a skater, was uncertain, but media reports said there were at least 14 on the flight.

Officials said they do not believe there were any survivors.

The Skating Club of Boston said it lost six individuals from its organization: athlete Jinna Han and her mother, Jin Han, athlete Spencer Lane and his mother, Christine Lane, and coaches Vadim Naumov and Evgenia Shishkova, also known as Genia.

Shishkova and Naumov, who were married to each other, won the World Championships in pairs figure skating in 1994, and U.S. media said they had lived in the United States since at least 1998, where they trained young ice skaters.

"Our sport and this club have suffered a horrible loss with this tragedy. Skating is a tight-knit community where parents and kids come together for 6 or 7 days a week to train and work together," the Skating Club of Boston said in a statement.

"Everyone is like family."

Spencer Lane, a 16-year-old from Barrington, Rhode Island, posted photos and videos from the camp on his Instagram account hours before the crash.

"I am so happy to have qualified for national development camp earlier in November, it has been my goal almost ever since I became aware that it was a thing," he wrote in the caption.

"I learned so much new information that I can apply to my everyday life, and met so many amazing people!"

The teenager later posted a photo of an airplane wing to his Instagram story with the caption "ICT (to) DCA," the airport codes for Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport and Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

Doug Zeghibe, executive director of the Skating Club of Boston, where Naumov and Shishkova had coached since 2017, told local reporters that the pair were dedicated instructors.

Naumov "loved young kids, but he was also a firm disciplinarian – not in a punishment way by any means, but in boundaries and training," said Zeghibe. "Genia was incredibly resilient … You couldn’t see Genia without breaking into a smile."

Inna Volyanskaya, a former skater who competed for the Soviet Union, was also reported to have been on board, TASS said. She was a coach at the Washington Figure Skating Club, according to its website.

"We are devastated to hear the news of American Eagle flight 5342. Our thoughts and prayers are with our skating family during this difficult time," Washington Figure Skating Club said in a statement.

U.S. skaters took to social media to mourn the loss of life.

"I'm heartbroken by the tragic loss of my fellow skaters in this devastating accident," 2024 men's singles world champion Ilia Malinin said. "The figure skating community is a family, and this loss is beyond words."



(Reporting by Jasper Ward, Joseph Ax, Amy Tennery and Lori Ewing; additional reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Ross Colvin, Sharon Singleton, Hugh Lawson and Rod Nickel)