20-year-old Wichita woman traveling back to school was among victims in DC plane crash

Chance Swaim, The Kansas City Star on Jan 30, 2025

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A 20-year-old Wichita woman was among the 60 passengers of Flight 5342, her father said.

Grace Maxwell, a Wichita native, was on her way back to college when the American Airlines jet collided with a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C.

She had returned home to Wichita to attend her grandfather’s funeral. She was studying biomedical engineering at Cedarville University in Ohio, her father, Dean Maxwell, told The Eagle.

Dean Maxwell said his family has not been contacted by authorities about his daughter. He said he did speak to American Airlines’ Care Team a few times, and that they would call him back when they had information.

He said he doesn’t know when he’ll get more information and whether she is among the passengers who have been recovered from the Potomac River. Authorities have said no one survived.

“We don’t know,” Maxwell said. “We do know she was on the plane.”

Grace Maxwell is the first passenger identified that is from Wichita. Several other passengers, many with connections to U.S. Figure Skating, and crew members, who were from Charlotte, have been identified through social media posts and interviews with news outlets across the country.

The National Transportation Safety Board and American Airlines have not released a list of passengers, and President Donald Trump said they were from multiple countries, including Russia.

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