Former Miss Kansas contestant and attorney Kiah Duggins has been identified as one of the victims of Wednesday night’s plane crash into the Potomac River after a collision with a Black Hawk helicopter.
According to her former pageant director, Larry Strong, Duggins was traveling from Wichita to Washington, DC, as she prepared to join Howard University as a law professor this fall.
“It is with heavy heart that the Miss Augusta and Miss Butler County organization just learned that Kiah Duggins Miss Butler County 2014 [and] 2015 was a passenger in the plane that crashed last evening in Washington DC,” he wrote.
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“Keep the rest of the family in your thoughts and prayers at this difficult time.”
“Kiah was [a] top 10 finalist in 2014 and 2015 at the Miss Kansas Pageant.”
Duggins was a civil rights attorney with the non-profit Civil Rights Corps who “litigate[d] on behalf of movements challenging unconstitutional policing and money bail practices in Tennessee, Texas, and Washington, D.C.,” according to her profile on the organization’s website.
Duggins, a victim of the Potomac River crash, earned her law degree from Harvard University, where she served as president of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, according to the New York Post.
She also held multiple bachelor’s degrees from Wichita State University and completed a Fulbright grant in Taiwan before beginning her work in Washington, DC.
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In a Facebook post, former Sedgwick County Commissioner Lacey Cruse described Duggins as “a brave and beautiful soul, a light in the fight for civil rights.”
“Her loss is heartbreaking, not only for her family and friends but for everyone who believes in justice and equality,” she wrote. “May her work, her message, and her spirit continue to inspire and create change. Gone too soon but never forgotten.”
American Airlines Flight 5342 collided with an Army Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport around 9 p.m. Wednesday, marking the deadliest airline crash on U.S. soil in over 20 years.
All 67 onboard perished as the plane plunged into the icy Potomac River. Among the victims were 14 members of the U.S. Figure Skating Team, officials confirmed.
Recovery operations concluded late Thursday in Washington, D.C., with at least 40 bodies retrieved from the Potomac River following the deadly crash of American Airlines Flight 5342 and an Army Black Hawk helicopter, CNN reported.
The bodies of all three soldiers aboard the helicopter were recovered.
Authorities have yet to determine the cause of the collision.
