Former Thrashers coach dies in Russian plane crash

By George Mathis

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A former Atlanta Thrashers assistant coach died in a plane crash that killed at least 43 in western Russia Wednesday.

The plane, a Yak-42, was carrying the Lokomotiv hockey team from Yaroslavl.

Officials said Russian player Alexander Galimov survived the crash along with a crewmember.

Canadian Brad McCrimmon, an assistant coach with the Thrashers from 2003-2008, was aboard the plane.

McCrimmon, 52, is a native of Saskatchewan and head coach of the Russian team. He played defence for six NHL teams — Boston, Philadelphia, Calgary, Detroit, Hartford and Phoenix from 1979-80 to 1996-97.

He played 1,222 regular season games in the NHL, collecting 81 goals, 322 assists and 1,416 penalty minutes.

He was an assistant coach with the New York Islanders, Calgary Flames, Atlanta Thrashers and Detroit Red Wings. He also served as head coach of the Western Hockey League's Saskatoon Blades.

Eleven foreign players were reportedly onboard the jet. A Czech embassy official said Czech players Josef Vasicek, Karel Rachunek and Jan Marek were among those killed, and Latvian officials confirmed the death of Latvian defenseman Karlis Skrastins.

The plane that crashed was relatively new, built in 1993, and belonged to a small Moscow-based Yak Service company.

Swarms of police and rescue crews rushed to Tunoshna, a picturesque village with a blue-domed church on the banks of the Volga River. One of the plane's engines could be seen poking out of the river and a flotilla of boats combed the water for bodies. Russian rescue workers struggled to heft the bodies of large, strong athletes in stretchers up the muddy, steep riverbank.

One resident, Irina Pryakhova, saw the plane going down, then heard a loud bang and saw a plume of smoke.

"It was wobbling in flight, it was clear that something was wrong," she said. "I saw them pulling bodies to the shore, some still in their seats with seatbelts on."

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin immediately sent the nation's transport minister to the site, 10 miles (15 kilometers) east of Yaroslavl. President Dmitry Medvedev also planned to tour the crash site.

Lokomotiv Yaroslavl is a leading force in Russian hockey and came third in the KHL last year. McCrimmon took over in May. He was most recently an assistant coach with the Detroit Red Wings.

The Russian team also featured several top European players and former NHL stars, including Slovakian forward and national team captain Pavol Demitra, who played in the NHL for the St. Louis Blues and Vancouver Canucks.

Other top names on the team include Russian defenseman Ruslan Salei and Swedish goalie Stefan Liv.

The KHL is an international club league that pits together teams from Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Latvia and Slovakia. Lokomotiv was a three-time Russian League champion in 1997, 2002-2003. It took bronze last season.

A cup match between hockey teams Salavat Yulaev and Atlant in the central Russian city of Ufa was called off midway after news of the crash was announced by Kontinental Hockey League head Alexander Medvedev. Russian television broadcast images of an empty arena in Ufa as grief-stricken fans abandoned the stadium.

"We will do our best to ensure that hockey in Yaroslavl does not die, and that it continues to live for the people that were on that plane," said Russian Ice Hockey Federation President Vladislav Tretyak.

In recent years, Russia and the other former Soviet republics have had some of the world's worst air traffic safety records. Experts blame the poor safety record on the age of the aircraft, weak government controls, poor pilot training and a cost-cutting mentality.

Medvedev has announced plans to take aging Soviet-built planes out of service starting next year. The short- and medium-range Yak-42 has been in service since 1980 and about 100 are still being used by Russian carriers.

In June, another Russian passenger jet crashed in the northwestern city of Petrozavodsk, killing 47 people. The crash of that Tu-134 plane has been blamed on pilot error.

In other plane crashes involving sports teams, 30 members of the Uruguayan rugby club Old Christians were killed in a crash in the Andes in 1972.

The entire 18-member U.S. figure skating team died in a crash on their way to the 1961 world championships in Brussels.

In 1949, the Torino soccer team lost 18 players near Turin, Italy, while the Munich air crash of 1958 cost eight Manchester United players their lives.

-- The Associated Press contributed to this article.