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On February 15, 1961, the entire US figure-skating team was killed in a plane crash.
Last edited Wed Mar 26, 2025, 04:03 PM - Edit history (3)
Sabena Flight 548
A Sabena Boeing 707-329, similar to the aircraft involved in the accident
Accident
Date: February 15, 1961
Summary: Undetermined (likely loss of control due to possible mechanical failure)
Site: near Kampenhout, Belgium
Coordinates: 50.934°N 4.536°E
Total fatalities: 73
Total injuries: 1
Sabena Flight 548 was a Boeing 707-329 flight operated by Sabena that crashed en route from New York City to Brussels, Belgium, on February 15, 1961. The flight, which had originated at Idlewild International Airport crashed on approach to Zaventem Airport, Brussels, killing all 72 people on board and one person on the ground. The fatalities included the entire United States figure-skating team, who were travelling to the World Figure Skating Championships in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The precise cause of the crash remains unknown; the most likely explanation was thought to be a failure of the mechanism that adjusted the tail stabilizer.
This was the first fatal accident involving a Boeing 707 in regular passenger service; it happened 28 months after the 707 airliner was placed into commercial use. It remains the deadliest plane crash ever to occur on Belgian soil.
{snip}
Loss of U.S. Figure Skating team
All eighteen members of the 1961 U.S. Figure Skating team lost their lives, as well as sixteen other people who were accompanying them, including family members, professional coaches, and skating officials. Among the fatalities were nine-times U.S. ladies' champion, turned coach, Maribel Vinson-Owen and her two daughters: reigning U.S. ladies' champion Laurence Owen, aged sixteen, and her 20-year-old sister, reigning U.S. pairs champion Maribel Owen, both of whom had won gold medals at the 1961 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Colorado Springs just two weeks earlier. Laurence Owen was the cover story for the February 13 issue of Sports Illustrated, just two days before her untimely death.
Maribel Owen's pairs champion partner Dudley "Dud" Richards and reigning U.S. men's champion Bradley Lord were also killed, along with U.S. ice dance champions Diane "Dee Dee" Sherbloom and Larry Pierce. The team also lost U.S. men's silver medalist Gregory Kelley, U.S. ladies' silver medalist Stephanie "Steffi" Westerfeld, and U.S. ladies' bronze medalist Rhode Lee Michelson.
Despite the fact that some national teams had already arrived in Prague for the World Championships—which were scheduled to start on February 22—the devastating loss of the U.S. team forced the event to be canceled. The competition organizers in Prague initially confirmed that the event would go ahead, but the International Skating Union (ISU) conducted a poll to agree on the most appropriate course of action; the vote, which took place on February 16, went in favor of cancelation out of respect for the U.S. team. A telegram was sent from ISU headquarters which read: "In view of the tragic death of 44 [sic] American skaters and officials the 1961 world championship will not be held." Prague was given the chance to host the event the following year.
Aftermath
{snip}
The disaster prompted U.S. Figure Skating executives to issue a mandate that still applies today: No team traveling to an international competition would ever be allowed to fly together again.
{snip}
A Sabena Boeing 707-329, similar to the aircraft involved in the accident
Accident
Date: February 15, 1961
Summary: Undetermined (likely loss of control due to possible mechanical failure)
Site: near Kampenhout, Belgium
Coordinates: 50.934°N 4.536°E
Total fatalities: 73
Total injuries: 1
Sabena Flight 548 was a Boeing 707-329 flight operated by Sabena that crashed en route from New York City to Brussels, Belgium, on February 15, 1961. The flight, which had originated at Idlewild International Airport crashed on approach to Zaventem Airport, Brussels, killing all 72 people on board and one person on the ground. The fatalities included the entire United States figure-skating team, who were travelling to the World Figure Skating Championships in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The precise cause of the crash remains unknown; the most likely explanation was thought to be a failure of the mechanism that adjusted the tail stabilizer.
This was the first fatal accident involving a Boeing 707 in regular passenger service; it happened 28 months after the 707 airliner was placed into commercial use. It remains the deadliest plane crash ever to occur on Belgian soil.
{snip}
Loss of U.S. Figure Skating team
All eighteen members of the 1961 U.S. Figure Skating team lost their lives, as well as sixteen other people who were accompanying them, including family members, professional coaches, and skating officials. Among the fatalities were nine-times U.S. ladies' champion, turned coach, Maribel Vinson-Owen and her two daughters: reigning U.S. ladies' champion Laurence Owen, aged sixteen, and her 20-year-old sister, reigning U.S. pairs champion Maribel Owen, both of whom had won gold medals at the 1961 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Colorado Springs just two weeks earlier. Laurence Owen was the cover story for the February 13 issue of Sports Illustrated, just two days before her untimely death.
Maribel Owen's pairs champion partner Dudley "Dud" Richards and reigning U.S. men's champion Bradley Lord were also killed, along with U.S. ice dance champions Diane "Dee Dee" Sherbloom and Larry Pierce. The team also lost U.S. men's silver medalist Gregory Kelley, U.S. ladies' silver medalist Stephanie "Steffi" Westerfeld, and U.S. ladies' bronze medalist Rhode Lee Michelson.
Despite the fact that some national teams had already arrived in Prague for the World Championships—which were scheduled to start on February 22—the devastating loss of the U.S. team forced the event to be canceled. The competition organizers in Prague initially confirmed that the event would go ahead, but the International Skating Union (ISU) conducted a poll to agree on the most appropriate course of action; the vote, which took place on February 16, went in favor of cancelation out of respect for the U.S. team. A telegram was sent from ISU headquarters which read: "In view of the tragic death of 44 [sic] American skaters and officials the 1961 world championship will not be held." Prague was given the chance to host the event the following year.
Aftermath
{snip}
The disaster prompted U.S. Figure Skating executives to issue a mandate that still applies today: No team traveling to an international competition would ever be allowed to fly together again.
{snip}
https://news.google.com/search?q=A%20Crash%20in%201961%20Devastated%20the%20Boston%20Skating%20Club.%20Then%20It%20Happened%20Again.
LOCAL
DC plane crash is second air tragedy for The Skating Club of Boston. The first was in 1961
Catherine Messier
USA TODAY NETWORK - New England
Published 2:00 p.m. ET Jan. 30, 2025 | Updated 4:06 p.m. ET Jan. 30, 2025
Six members of The Skating Club of Boston were aboard the fatal plane collision near Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C. Wednesday night, including two coaches, two athletes and the two mothers of the athletes.
The tragedy has devastated The Skating Club, and, for some, recalled memories of a similar air tragedy the club suffered decades ago - a 1960s plane crash that killed 10 members of Boston's premiere skating club, including "America's Queen of the Ice," Laurence Owen.
Now, just 64 years after losing members in a plane crash, The Skating Club of Boston has suffered another air tragedy.
U.S. Figure Skating team suffered plane crash in 1961
On Feb. 15, 1961, a plane with all 18 members of the U.S. Figure Skating Team heading from New York to the World Championships in Prague crashed on approach in Brussels, Belgium. All 73 passengers, including skaters, coaches, officials and family members, died, including 10 members of The Skating Club of Boston.
{snip}
DC plane crash is second air tragedy for The Skating Club of Boston. The first was in 1961
Catherine Messier
USA TODAY NETWORK - New England
Published 2:00 p.m. ET Jan. 30, 2025 | Updated 4:06 p.m. ET Jan. 30, 2025
Six members of The Skating Club of Boston were aboard the fatal plane collision near Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C. Wednesday night, including two coaches, two athletes and the two mothers of the athletes.
The tragedy has devastated The Skating Club, and, for some, recalled memories of a similar air tragedy the club suffered decades ago - a 1960s plane crash that killed 10 members of Boston's premiere skating club, including "America's Queen of the Ice," Laurence Owen.
Now, just 64 years after losing members in a plane crash, The Skating Club of Boston has suffered another air tragedy.
U.S. Figure Skating team suffered plane crash in 1961
On Feb. 15, 1961, a plane with all 18 members of the U.S. Figure Skating Team heading from New York to the World Championships in Prague crashed on approach in Brussels, Belgium. All 73 passengers, including skaters, coaches, officials and family members, died, including 10 members of The Skating Club of Boston.
{snip}
A Plane Crash in 1961 Devastated the Boston Skating Club. Then It Happened Again.
Two months after the D.C. plane crash killed 67, including six people affiliated with the Boston club, the members had to prepare for the world championships. Unfathomably, they had a blueprint.
Misha Mitrofanov and Alisa Efimova, who won the pairs title at the 2025 U.S. Championships, will be competing at the World Figure Skating Championships in Boston this week. Sophie Park for The New York Times
By Juliet Macur
Juliet Macur has covered figure skating since 2003 and reported this article from Boston; Washington, D.C.; and Norwood, Mass.
March 26, 2025
Updated 2:04 p.m. ET
One floor above the ice rinks at the Skating Club of Boston, there’s a lounge that would have hosted a party after January’s U.S. Figure Skating national championships. ... Its glass doors would have been thrown open, and its fireplace set aglow, as several hundred people gathered to toast the club’s latest champions, the pairs skaters Alisa Efimova and Misha Mitrofanov, who had won their first national title.
But that celebration never happened. It couldn’t, and it wouldn’t, after six of the club’s members died in a plane crash on Jan. 29 in Washington. Twenty-eight passengers involved in skating, including 11 young athletes and four coaches, were among the 67 people killed that day.
Jinna Han, 13, and Spencer Lane, 16, two of the organization’s up-and-coming skaters, were traveling home with their mothers from a development camp held after the nationals in Wichita., Kan., when an Army helicopter collided with their passenger jet above the Potomac River. No one survived. Two of the club’s coaches — Vadim Naumov and Evgenia Shishkova, a married couple who were the 1994 world champions in pairs — were also on the plane.
Yet the lounge at the Boston club did not remain empty. In the hours and days after the crash, one by one, or arm in arm, people arrived and filled the space, drawn to the beloved club that has existed for more than a century, and to a community that many consider a second family.
Paul George, a longtime club member, hugs former Olympic figure skaters Dr. Tenley Albright and Nancy Kerrigan. Sophie Park for The New York Times
{snip}
Juliet Macur is a national reporter at The Times, based in Washington, D.C., who often writes about America through the lens of sports. More about Juliet Macur
Two months after the D.C. plane crash killed 67, including six people affiliated with the Boston club, the members had to prepare for the world championships. Unfathomably, they had a blueprint.
Misha Mitrofanov and Alisa Efimova, who won the pairs title at the 2025 U.S. Championships, will be competing at the World Figure Skating Championships in Boston this week. Sophie Park for The New York Times
By Juliet Macur
Juliet Macur has covered figure skating since 2003 and reported this article from Boston; Washington, D.C.; and Norwood, Mass.
March 26, 2025
Updated 2:04 p.m. ET
One floor above the ice rinks at the Skating Club of Boston, there’s a lounge that would have hosted a party after January’s U.S. Figure Skating national championships. ... Its glass doors would have been thrown open, and its fireplace set aglow, as several hundred people gathered to toast the club’s latest champions, the pairs skaters Alisa Efimova and Misha Mitrofanov, who had won their first national title.
But that celebration never happened. It couldn’t, and it wouldn’t, after six of the club’s members died in a plane crash on Jan. 29 in Washington. Twenty-eight passengers involved in skating, including 11 young athletes and four coaches, were among the 67 people killed that day.
Jinna Han, 13, and Spencer Lane, 16, two of the organization’s up-and-coming skaters, were traveling home with their mothers from a development camp held after the nationals in Wichita., Kan., when an Army helicopter collided with their passenger jet above the Potomac River. No one survived. Two of the club’s coaches — Vadim Naumov and Evgenia Shishkova, a married couple who were the 1994 world champions in pairs — were also on the plane.
Yet the lounge at the Boston club did not remain empty. In the hours and days after the crash, one by one, or arm in arm, people arrived and filled the space, drawn to the beloved club that has existed for more than a century, and to a community that many consider a second family.
Paul George, a longtime club member, hugs former Olympic figure skaters Dr. Tenley Albright and Nancy Kerrigan. Sophie Park for The New York Times
{snip}
Juliet Macur is a national reporter at The Times, based in Washington, D.C., who often writes about America through the lens of sports. More about Juliet Macur
Fri Jan 31, 2025: Ashburn Ice House Coach, Local Skaters Killed in Potomac River Plane Crash
Thu Jan 30, 2025: 14 from figure skating community killed in plane crash, six of them from Boston club
Thu Jan 30, 2025: On February 15, 1961, the entire US figure-skating team was killed in a plane crash.
Thu Feb 15, 2024: On this day, February 15, 1961, the entire US figure-skating team was killed in a plane crash.
Wed Feb 15, 2023: On this day, February 15, 1961, the entire US figure-skating team was killed in a plane crash.
Mon Feb 15, 2021: On this day, February 15, 1961, the entire US figure-skating team was killed in a plane crash.