An Argentine citizen killed in the plane crash in Washington on Wednesday night has been named as Luciano Aparicio by U.S. and Argentine media. Sixty-seven people died after an American Airlines flight collided with a military helicopter in Washington, D.C.

Aparicio was traveling with his 13-year-old son Franco, who was a Chilean national, U.S. and Argentine media reported. Like many of their fellow passengers, they were returning from a major figure skating camp and championship in Kansas.

Luciano was an accountant specializing in the energy sector. He was vice president of AES Corporation, a multinational power company. Local media report that Franco was born while the family was living in Chile. They later moved to Washington, D.C.

The family’s friends and relatives have posted heartfelt commemorative messages on social networks.

“Franco Aparicio was one of the first skaters that I ever head coached, and I taught him and his sister, Isabella, from their first day of learning to skate until I relocated to Chicago in 2019,” wrote skating coach Tommy Steenberg on Facebook. 

“I was tickled with the progress he made year after year since then under Inna Volyanskaya [a coach who also lost her life] and was delighted to see and hug both of them last week in Wichita. I am devastated to hear that Franco, his father (Luciano), and Inna were on flight AA 5342.”

Argentina’s Foreign Ministry and embassy in the United States could not be reached for comment.

American Eagle Flight 5342 was en route from Wichita, Kansas, to Washington, D.C. It crashed with the helicopter as it was making its final approach to the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. The Black Hawk military helicopter, with three people on board, was on a training flight. Federal aviation investigators vowed to establish the cause of the crash.

U.S. President Donald Trump suggested the helicopter was flying too high before the collision. “What was the helicopter doing in that track? Very sad. But visually, somebody should have been able to see and taken that helicopter out of play and they should have been at a different height,” he posted on his Truth Social account, the social media platform he founded.

The president also suggested, without evidence, that Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies intended to hire individuals with disabilities were to blame for the accident.

“If [air traffic controllers] don’t have a great brain, a great power of the brain, they’re not going to be very good at what they do,” Trump said during a press conference on Thursday morning.