(MENAFN- The Peninsula)
The Washington Post
The trip to Wichita was supposed to be the best one yet for Brielle and Justyna Beyer.
The mother-daughter pair had traveled from their home in Northern Virginia to Kansas for a training program for the country's best young figure skaters - a small, elite group that now included Brielle.
It was a major achievement for the 12-year-old, who despite a cancer diagnosis as a baby had worked to become one of the top girls in her age group nationally. So, too, for Justyna, 42, who left behind her nursing career to care for her daughter and then support her dreams on the ice.
For six days in Kansas, they watched with awe as older skaters competed in the national championships. They fueled up on pancakes at a diner every morning. Justyna celebrated when Brielle landed a clean triple Lutz in practice.
The pair was on a flight back home Wednesday night when their plane and a military helicopter collided as the plane neared the runway at Reagan National Airport,sending it plunging into the frigid Potomac River. Another 62 people also were aboard the jet, and three were aboard the helicopter. None survived.
Outside the airport, Andy Beyer was in the car with their 6-year-old son Kallen watching for his wife to answer texts she never would. Before the emergency sirens, the terrible wait and the news that tore his family in half, it felt like one of the moments that had made their intense commitment to ice skating worthwhile.
"This sport can be a grind, and it's so important to find those moments where you are just filled with the joy of the whole thing,” said Beyer, 44. "This trip was one of those moments.”
The same might have been said of many aboard American Eagle Flight 5342, which carried at least 10 young skaters, as well as many of their parents and coaches, from the D.C. and Boston areas who had been at the U.S. Figure Skating training camp.
Competitive sports or musiccan be all-consuming for any parent. But figure skating - particularly at the level of competition required for an invitation to the high-development training camp - is a uniquely demanding sport, requiring hours on the ice; thousands of dollars for classes, skates and uniforms; and the willingness to train, get injured, heal, and do it all over again.
Parents often sacrifice as much as the athletes themselves, and all of the young skaters were traveling with at least one parent. A family of four who were all on the plane had built an outdoor rink in their yard and spent nearly half the year on the road, driving from Virginia to New Jersey every week for practices. One parent in Prince George's County dutifully took notes at each practice to help her daughter improve.
And in Aldie, Virginia, Andy and Justynamade Brielle's greatest passion the center of their family's world.
Andy changed jobs so he could work remotely from the ice rink, and Brielle switched to a mostly virtual school. The whole family relished her breakthroughs - seeing her flash a radiant smile when she landed new moves - even as they spent more than their monthly mortgage payments on classes and traded family vacations for her competition trips.
The family gave it all to ice skating, Beyer said. And "now, in hindsight,” he added, "I can say it took everything from me.”
Justyna, whom he called a "lioness” for her protective nature, devoted herself to her kids: She decorated their house with as many as six trees for the holidays, he said, and picked out cozy outfits they'd wear on road trips to visit family members in Connecticut. (As per family tradition, they would take pictures at every rest stop on the way.)
Brielle started skating lessons at age 4 in part because of her parents: Her dad played ice hockey, and her mother, who moved from Poland to the United States as a girl, had long admired the sport's beauty.
As a baby, Brielle was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, marking a painful and anxious time for her parents as she went through surgeries and was, at one point, on a ventilator. She was left with residual nerve differences in her legs - a physical challenge that could impact her on the rink.
As soon as she took her first class at age 4, though, Brielle made it look effortless. By second grade, she was landing single axels and double Salchows, and training in the basement with Andy on plyometrics or jumping capability.
Even off the rink, she practiced any chance she could get - on the playground, on vacation and on a trip to the Kings Dominion amusement park. Justyna, who had left her career as an emergency room nurse to care for Brielle during her cancer battle, transitioned to running the household and helping with Brielle's skating career.
As Brielle excelled, her family gave more of themselves, too. When her coaches moved facilities, Andy and Justyna began taking turns driving Brielle to MedStar Capitals Iceplex in Arlington - about an hour from their house without traffic - for her to practice nearly every day.
Kallen took to the rink, too, taking up ice hockey.
But Justyna and Andy also made a point of finding time for activities outside of skating for the preteen. Brielle sang in Loudoun All-County Chorus and liked to play "family” with Kallen. They scheduled play dates with her friends on the weekends.
"Their level of commitment was astounding,” said Pat McNanley, a family friend who lives around the corner from the Beyers.
But, McNanley added, it did not take over other parts of Brielle's life: "She was at a high level and training four hours a day and still had these great friendships with multiple girls that weren't even in the ice skating world.”
It was all worth it to watch her shine. Andy said his daughter particularly relished"improv” time where she would free skate on the ice after every one of her sessions.
After placing third in her category ata regional competition last year, she was invited to U.S. Figure Skating's national development camp, a multiday training program for the country's best young skaters held in tandem with the national championships.
Brielle could not wait to travel to Wichita for the high-development camp. "It was a big life goal of hers, and she was so proud of herself,” Andy said. "And Justyna was so proud of her, too.”
The mother-daughter pair had never been gone from home for a skating trip as long as this one. They called and FaceTimed with Kallen and Andy multiple times a day. Brielle lit up telling them about the special red jacket she got from the skating association and how excited she was to wear it at home. She told them about the pancake breakfasts, a family tradition, and even got to take photos with some of her skating heroes.
In the morning before championships, skaters too young to compete, like Brielle, got time to practice on the ice. She was invited to have a U.S. Figure Skating official watch her practice her triple Lutzes and triple toe loops. She landed a nearly clean triple axel - almost unimaginable for someone so young.
There were more FaceTimes as the week went on.
"We really miss you,” they told each other.
"Can't wait to see you,” they said.
As he always did on these trips, Andy drove with Kallen to pick them up from the airport. Before takeoff, Justyna texted him with delight about how the flight attendants had given her a free glass of wine on the plane.
From the cellphone lot, he texted her to ask: Would they be landing soon? Are they ready to be picked up?
Police sirens started sounding around him. Fire trucks sped by.
He kept sending messages, but his texts stopped going through.
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