Flight attendant killed in Washington DC plane crash was former BBYO member

One of the flight attendants killed in last week’s plane crash in Washington DC was a former member of a Jewish youth group with a passion for travel and a talent for comedy.

Ian Epstein, one of the four attendants on American Eagle Flight 5342, was an alumnus of BBYO, the group posted to Facebook on Thursday.

He is one of 67 victims of the crash on Wednesday night over the Potomac River, in which an army helicopter collided with a passenger aircraft.

The pluralist youth group BBYO posted: “Our hearts are heavy as we mourn the loss of Ian Epstein, an AZA [Aleph Zadik Aleph] alum, who tragically lost his life in the plane crash at Reagan National Airport yesterday. Ian was a proud member of our movement and attended our summer leadership camps at Perlman [in Pennsylvania] in 1987.”

Commenters shared recollections of him, including one who called him “always a lively, high-spirited person”. Several said they had known him and his sister from their time with the youth group.

Epstein’s love for seeing new places was clear from his online posts. According to his LinkedIn profile, before becoming a flight attendant in 2020 he founded a travel agency and worked as a motor home salesman. According to an Instagram account he kept active about a decade ago, Epstein lived in an motor home at one point and posted photos from his destinations, writing in one post: “Travel as much as you can as far as you can as long as you can, life is not meant to be spent in one place.”

His ex-wife Debi Epstein told Queen City News: “He died doing what he loved.” Epstein had two children, and his daughter is getting married in eight weeks, she added. “That was just our last conversation with him and her, was about the wedding.”

Epstein was known for his sense of humour, and since publication of his name a video of him delivering jokes and one-liners during in-flight announcements on a regional flight to Charlotte has been viewed more than a million times on TikTok.

“There is absolutely positively not to be one ounce of mopeyness or groaning on this plane,” he says at one point. “Welcome aboard, everybody, we’re glad you’re here.”