"This is going to be really hard on our skating community for a very, very long time," said Wichita Skating Club President Jolene Taylor. "You don't think that tomorrow they might not be here."

Sean O'Reilly, general manager of the Wichita Ice Center, said his team got to know numerous athletes who had been in Wichita for a development camp after the U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

Just days after figure skaters, family and coaches from across the United States came together in Wichita, a tragic plane crash has left the U.S. Figure Skating community reeling.

The community had just hosted the U.S. National Figure Skating Championships, the first national skating event held here and a huge feather in the cap of local residents who had spent years working to build up the sport,

World champion figure skaters, a pilot planning his wedding and teenaged skaters seen as the "future of the sport" were among the 67 victims of the deadly midair collision between a commercial jet and a U.