The bodies of married Russian figure skaters Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov have been found after they were on board the American Airlines flight that crashed in Washington DC on Wednesday night.
Police boats continued to comb the banks of the Potomac River on Friday, moving slowly under rainy skies and scanning the shoreline as investigators sought clues into the midair collision that killed 67 people.
No one survived the Wednesday night collision between the commercial airliner and an Army helicopter.
More than 40 bodies have been pulled from the river as the massive recovery effort continues.
And reports in Russia have quoted renowned figure skating coach Lyudmila Velikova, who confirmed that the bodies of Shishkova and Naumov have been recovered.
They were not the only Russians on board the plane, according to the report. Soviet figure skater Inna Volyanskaya, who worked in the US as a coach, was a passenger along with former figure skater Alexander Kirsanov.
The bodies of Russian figure skaters Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov have been found
Shishkova and Naumov won the pairs title at the 1994 world championships in Chiba, Japan
Shishkova and Naumov won the pairs title at the 1994 world championships in Chiba, Japan. They also competed twice in the Olympics.
They coached American skaters Jinna Han and Spencer Lane, who were also among those killed along with their mothers, Jin Han and Christine Lane.
Skating organizations in Philadelphia and the Washington area also said some of their young athletes had been aboard the plane.
In Virginia’s Loudoun County, a coach at a skating club was also identified as among the passengers, Virginia Rep. Suhas Subramanyam confirmed.
The club, Ashburn Ice House, said that its ‘figure skating community has been directly affected,’ but did not give further details.
Several athletes on the flight had attended a development camp held after the U.S. Figure Skating Championships ended Sunday in Wichita, Kansas.
Among those grief-stricken was Nancy Kerrigan, a former US women’s champion and two-time Olympic and world medalist based in Boston, where the World Figure Skating Championships will be held in March.
‘Not sure how to process it,’ she said, breaking down in tears. ‘When you find out you know some of the people on the plane, it’s an even bigger blow.’
Figure skater, Spencer Lane, 16, (middle back) pictured with Shishkova and Naumov, also died
Spencer Lane, 16, also shared this photo from inside the doomed American Airlines plane
Added reigning world and US men’s champion Ilia Malinin: ‘I’m heartbroken by the tragic loss of my fellow skaters in this devastating accident. This loss is beyond words.’
Doug Zeghibe, chief executive of The Skating Club of Boston, confirmed the identities of six club members on the plane, including Shishkova and Naumov.
‘To the best of our knowledge, 14 skaters returning home… were lost in the plane crash,’ said Zeghibe, who declared the disaster would have ‘long-reaching impacts’ for the sport.
US Figure Skating, in a statement, confirmed only that ‘several members of our skating community’ were on the plane.
‘We are devastated by this unspeakable tragedy and hold the victims’ families closely in our hearts.’
‘I’ve never seen anyone love skating as much as these two and that’s why I think it hurts so much,’ Kerrigan said of Han, 13, and Lane, 16.
‘The kids care. They work really hard to be here. Their parents work hard… it’s just such a tragic event.’
Officials have now heavily restricted helicopter traffic around the airport, hours after President Donald Trump claimed in a social media post that the Army Black Hawk had been flying higher than its allowed limit.
Jinna Han (pictured front row in red) and her mother Jin were also confirmed as passengers
Nancy Kerrigan broke down in tears as she spoke outside the Boston skating club that lost six members of its group in the DC plane crash
Planes continued to take off and land at Reagan Reagan National Airport after the worst U.S. air disaster in a generation, with airport operations gradually returning to normal after a slew of canceled and delayed flights following the crash.
Investigators have already recovered the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder of the American Airlines plane, which struck the chopper as the plane was coming in for a landing at the airport next to Washington, D.C.
Officials are scrutinizing a range of factors in what National Transportation Safety Board Chairwoman Jennifer Hommendy has called an ‘all-hands-on-deck event.’
Investigators are examining the actions of the military pilot as well as air traffic control after the helicopter apparently flew into the jet’s path.
Air crash investigations normally take 12-18 months, and investigators told reporters Thursday that they wouldn’t speculate on the cause.
