World champion Russian skaters on American Airlines jet built a new life as coaches in the US
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — The two Russian figure skating coaches killed in the American Airlines crash were two-time Olympians and former world champions in the pairs event.
They were also a married couple with a son who finished fourth last week at the U.S. national championships in Wichita, Kansas. Their son was not on the same flight.
Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov won a world championship title together in pairs skating in 1994 and narrowly missed out on Olympic medals that year at the Lillehammer Games before moving to the U.S. and coaching generations of young skaters in New England.
After their son Maxim Naumov skated at the national championships, the 52-year-old Shishkova and her 55-year-old husband stayed in Wichita for a development camp for some of the most promising young skaters in the country.
On Wednesday night, the American Airlines jet they were on collided with an Army helicopter near Washington and crashed into the frigid waters of the Potomac River. There were 60 passengers and four crew members on the American Airlines flight and three soldiers aboard the Blackhawk helicopter. Hope of rescuing any survivors evaporated by daybreak.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed Thursday morning that the pair had been on board the plane, and the Skating Club of Boston, where they coached, said Shishkova and Naumov had been killed.
“We are sorry and send condolences to the families and friends who lost those of our fellow citizens who died in the plane crash,” Peskov said.
Two teenage figure skaters and their mothers who were affiliated with the Boston club were also on the flight.
Lyudmila Velikova, the former coach of Shishkova and Naumov, told Russian state news agency Tass she had been in touch with Shishkova and Naumov regularly and that they had spoken shortly before last week's event in Kansas.
“Everything was going well for them. They traveled to the main competitions in America and they had very good, worthy students,” Velikova said. “Many people wanted to work with them.”
Shishkova and Naumov started skating together in the 1980s in the Soviet Union and were two-time Olympians, but the peak of their career came in 1994 when they won a world championship gold medal together in Chiba, Japan. It was just over a month after they had narrowly missed out on medals at the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics.
“They were truly remarkable. Remarkable and kind people, excellent coaches, great friends and wonderful parents,” U.S. skaters Melissa Gregory and Denis Petukhov, who competed at the 2006 Turin Olympics and said they had known Shishkova and Naumov for nearly 30 years, wrote on Facebook.
Shishkova and Naumov were among many Russian skaters who sought a new life as coaches in the U.S. following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Their profiles on the Skating Club of Boston website stated that each had qualified as sports instructors in St. Petersburg, Russia, and that each had at least 20 years of coaching experience. They had also coached at the International Skating Center of Connecticut.
One of their top students was their own son, who won the U.S. junior men's title in 2020. He was named last week on the U.S. team to compete at next month's Four Continents Championships in South Korea and as an alternate for the world championships in Boston in March.
The Russian skating federation issued a statement of condolences Thursday.
“The Russian Figure Skating Federation, Russian skaters, coaches, judges and experts are shocked and deeply saddened by the tragedy which has occurred in Washington,” the federation said in a statement. "All of us express our sincere condolences to the families and friends of those who have died, and also to the U.S. Figure Skating Association, which has lost talented junior athletes and qualified coaches in this air disaster. Some of them were our compatriots and had made a significant contribution to (Russian) figure skating."
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