Flight attendant killed in DC crash wasnt supposed to be on doomed plane but switched shifts days before: This was not his line
One of the flight attendants killed when an American Airlines jet and an Army helicopter collided at Reagan National Airport was not scheduled to be onboard the doomed plane, but had switched shifts just days earlier.Ian Epstein, 53, traded shifts with a coworker so he could go golfing the Sunday before the crash, his devastated ex-wife told People.“This was not his line,” said Debi Epstein, 58, “This was not a flight he was supposed to be on.”Three days after that last round of golf, Epstein was killed on Jan.29 along with 66 others as the flight from Wichita, Kansas, was landing in DC.Epstein became a flight attendant because of a deep “passion” for travel, his ex-wife said, explaining he even once told her he’d “rather die doing what I love than not do it.”“He wanted to do it so badly, and I wanted him to have his dream,” Debi told the outlet.“And he did,” she said.
“He died doing absolutely what he loved.He loved interacting with people.
He loved traveling.”The couple met in NYC in 1997 and had two daughters, remaining close despite divorcing in 2022.“I know he loved me, and I know I still loved him,” she said, adding that he was gregarious and outgoing — characteristics that made him shine as a flight attendant.“He was a character.He was a comedian.
He enjoyed putting on a show, and he did.He brought that to being a flight attendant and greeting everybody with a smile and just making them feel comfortable flying,” she said.“He was just so outgoing and just tried to get on the same level with everybody that he met.”That love of life extended to their children — and their youngest daughter plans to pay tribute to him by wearing the airline wings he had on at the time of the crash.She is also going to have her wedding ring remade to incorporate a piece of the wings.Though the family is devastated by the loss, Ian’s death has shown them how many other people he impacted in his travels across the country.“We didn...