Westmont native, husband, kids among dead

BY RUSS O’REILLY

ROREILLY@TRIBDEM.COM

A woman originally from the Johnstown area, her husband and their two young daughters were among the passengers on a jet that crashed Wednesday night near Washington, D.C., a family member said Thursday.

Donna Smojice Livingston, formerly of Johnstown; her husband, Peter Livingston; and their daughters Everly, 14, and Alydia, 11, were aboard the American Eagle flight that collided with an Army helicopter while approaching Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, sending the two aircraft into the Potomac River.

The crash was the country’s worst aviation disaster in a generation, killing all 67 people aboard the two aircraft, The Associated Press reported.

Mark Smojice, president of Advanced Office Systems in Johnstown, confirmed in a brief phone call with The Tribune-

Please see FAMILY, A2 n 14 from figureskating community among crash victims/ www.TribDem.com

n Disaster ranks among deadly U.S. plane crashes/ www. TribDem.com

Figure skaters Alydia Livingston (left) and Everly Livingston were aboard a jet that crashed Wednesday near Washington, D.C.

PHOTO FROM FACEBOOK

DonnaLivingston PeterLivingston

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Democrat Thursday that his sister and her family were on the plane.

He said he called an American Airlines 800 number issued on a news feed for relatives of passengers and received confirmation that they were on the plane. He spoke to The Tribune- Democrat after traveling to inform his mother, who lives in Richland Township.

Robert Heffelfinger, of Richland Township, said the Smojice family is like part of his family. Heffelfinger is the vice president of Advanced Office Systems, a company started by Mark Smojice’s father-in law.

“Donna was a young and wonderful person,” he said. “She and her husband, Peter, had two children who were amazing ice skaters.”

Donna Smojice Livingston grew up on Wayne Street in Westmont Borough and was a 1995 Westmont Hilltop High School graduate. The Livingstons raised their children in Virginia; Peter Livingston was from the Richmond, Virginia, area, Heffelfinger said.

Several of the crash victims, including the Livingston girls and their parents, were coming back from a national development camp for promising young skaters held after the U.S. Figure Skating Championships that ended Sunday in Wichita, Kansas.

That camp is for the most elite group of young people on track to be among the next generation of high-level skaters, said Alexis Capouellez, president of the Skating Club of Johnstown.

Capouellez said the Livingston family would come to Johnstown annually to visit family, and the girls would skate with the club at 1st Summit Arena @ Cambria County War Memorial in Johnstown or the North Central Recreation Center in Ebensburg whenever they could.

“I just feel deeply saddened for all families involved in the tragedy,” Capouellez said.

Russ O’Reilly is a reporter for The Tribune-Democrat. Follow him on Twitter @RussellOReilly.