College student returning home for her grandfather's funeral among victims of American Airlines flight and Black Hawk DC collision

A 20-year-old student was among 67 passengers on doomed American Airlines flight 5342 after returning home to attend her grandfather's funeral.

Grace Maxwell, a 20-year-old biomedical engineering student at Cedarville University in Ohio, was on the doomed flight returning back to school.

She had reportedly been in Kansas to attend her grandfather's funeral, The Wichita Eagle reports.

Her father told the publication that she 'was on the plane', but that he'd not yet heard from authorities regarding any further details.

Cedarville University told WLWT that Maxwell's death will be formally addressed with the student body during an all-campus chapel program on Friday.

'As you can imagine, the past 24 hours have been very difficult for the Maxwell family and the Cedarville University community,' the school said.

'As a university, we do not desire to turn this tragic event into anything more than a way to honor Grace, her family, and Jesus.'

Maxwell was due to graduate in 2026. 

'Grace was a resident of Maddox Hall and known to be a thoughtful, quiet student leader,' her school said.

'During her college years, she assisted mechanical engineering faculty as a grader.'

Maxwell's secondary advisor, Dr Tim Norman, described her as 'a quiet person with a keen interest in helping others through engineering.'

She was 'scheduled to serve on a project team this semester that would begin to create a hand-stabilizing device for a differently enabled Dayton boy so he could feed himself rather than relying on others.'

The school said: 'Even though we don't understand why this has happened, we are confident that Grace is with Jesus Christ. 

'Those of us who believe in Christ will see her again. We grieve, but not as those without hope.'

Counseling services will be available for all students and staff. 

Around 40 bodies have already been pulled from the wreckage at Potomac River in Washington DC. 

Divers will return on Friday to continue searching for the remaining victims.

There were 60 passengers on board the plane and four crew members, as well as three soldiers on board the Black Hawk Army helicopter it collided with.

Authorities say there are no survivors.

David Hoagland, President of the DC Fire Fighters Association, revealed on Thursday night the harrowing scenes first responders were confronted with.

'It's graphic. They encountered people inside the plane still strapped in their seats, and they weren't able to remove them right away,' Hoagland said.

'Today, a lot of the effort has been focused on removing people from inside the plane who they were not able to remove last night, as well as just continuing to scan the entire area to see who they can locate.'