Members of the United States figure skating community were among the first Thursday to confirm the identities of passengers killed on Flight 5342.
Clubs and sport organizations said their grief was continuing to grow as they received more information.
The flight from Wichita on Wednesday night collided with a military helicopter while approaching Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. All 64 people onboard the commercial flight died.
The Skating Club of Boston confirmed that six people associated with its organization died in the crash.
Figure skaters Spencer Lane, 16, and Jinna Han, 15, and coaches Evgenia Shishkova and Vadmin Naumov. Lane’s mother, Christine, and Han’s mother, Jin, were also traveling with the athletes and coaches.
“Our sport and this club have suffered a horrible loss with this tragedy,” Doug Zeghibe, the CEO and executive director of the club said in a statement. “We are devastated and completely at a loss for words.”
Zeghibe said that the skaters were in Wichita as part of the U.S. Figure Skating’s National Development Camp. The camp, which is used by the sporting body to develop young competitive skaters into world class athletes, followed the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in the city. The camp concluded Wednesday at the Wichita Ice Center.
The Skating Club of Boston said that it sent 18 athletes to compete at the championships and 12 athletes to participate in the development camp.
U.S. Figure Skating said in a statement Thursday morning that “several members of our skating community” were on the flight.
Shishkova and Naumov were in Wichita in their capacity as coaches, but were also well-known figure skaters in their own right. Originally from Russia, they were former world gold medalist pairs figure skaters.
In 1994, they won the pairs title during the world championship competition in Chiba, Japan. They married in 1995 and went on to compete for Russia in two Olympics.
In 1998, the pair moved to the United States and began coaching at the International Skating Center in Simsbury, Connecticut. They began working with the Skating Club of Boston in 2017. Their son, Maxim Naumov, is also a competitive figure skater.
Maxim Naumov, 23, competed in Wichita last week, finishing fourth in the men’s free skate championship event. The Skating Club of Boston did not include him in the list of members that were lost during the crash.
The Boston club will help host the world championships in March.
U.S. figure skater and Olympian Brian Boitano came to Wichita last week to celebrate the championship event, which was in his mother’s hometown. On Thursday morning he said on X that his heart was breaking “for my skating family today.”
“My thoughts and prayers go out to all those impacted by this horrible tragedy,” Boitano said. “At a loss for words for my friends, Evgenia Shishkova & Vadim Naumov and their son Maxim.”
Russian officials confirmed to the Associated Press that Shishkova and Naumov were among several Russian nationals on Flight 5342.
