Northeast Ohio’s figure skating community is mourning the loss of both up and coming and established athletes following the crash of an American Airlines jet in Washington, D.C. Wednesday night.
The plane which collided with a U.S. Army helicopter as it was approaching Reagan National Airport was en route from Wichita, Kansas included passengers returning from the U.S. Figure Skating Championships and a youth development camp for juvenile and intermediate figure skating students.
"It's a camp to bring the skaters together and to try to excite them and give them training tips," said Tonia Kwiatkowski, a national medalist and coach at Winterhurst Figure Skating Club in Lakewood.
One of their students, who wishes to remain anonymous, attended the camp, Kwiatkowski said, but was not on Wednesday's flight.
"They’re grieving the loss of their friends, and want to send prayers and healing thoughts that they can get through this tragedy."
Kwiatkowski says she and the other coaches are prepared to support that student, and others, navigating grief during this time.
More than a dozen of the 60 passengers on board were members of the figure skating community, according to the Skating Club of Boston.
"You're losing young skaters that were very promising careers ahead of them," Kwiatkowski said. "There's also former world champions coaches that train not only these skaters, but other skaters ... and there's family members that are now gone."
This is a loss that will be difficulty to a recover from, Kwiatkowski said.
"There's a grieving process and I think there's it's going to be a really tough thing for many people to move forward. But I know people are resilient and hopefully they can find a way to honor the people that they've lost."
For some, the crash brought back memories of another devastating loss. In 1961, a plane flying from New York to Brussels crashed on approach, killing 72 people on board, including all members of the U.S. figure skating team who were on their way to a competition in Prague.
"The judges, officials, skaters, families all traveled together.," Kwiatkowski said. "It was a devastating loss for the U .S. figure skating team, and this is very tragic and it's going to have real effects, I think, moving forward."
The skating community at Winterhurst is still trying to process what happened, Kwiatkowski said, but they are open to participating in a memorial for the victims.
