RIP to the Victims of the Plane Crash in Russia

I was planning on writing a piece today, as soon as I got home about recent reports of John Tavares' departure from the Island, and Alexei Yashin's return.

However, when I got home, instead of finding Islander news awaiting for me, I instead found news of a plane crash in Russia which killed at least 43 people. The majority of these 43 were members of the Lokomotiv team in the KHL. Several ex-NHL players such as Pavol Demitra, Ruslan Salei, Karel Rachunek, Karlis Skrastins, Devil prospect Alexander Vasyunov, and former Islanders Josef Vasicek, Alexander Karpovtsev, and Brad McCrimmon.

There were 2 people lucky enough to have survived, if you can call them lucky that is. A crew member who's name hasn't been released, and forward Alexander Galimov have survived the crash, although Galimov has reportedly suffered burns on 80-90% of his body, and I expect similar injuries to have struck the surviving crew member.

Although it may not count for much, I feel it only just that in the memory of these players and passengers who died in this tragedy, to postpone any blog entries to tomorrow. I know it has been said several times, but as one who's brother is about to board a plane to travel across the world to Italy, my thoughts and prayers truly are with those who were lost in the crash, those who miraculously survived it, and most of all with those who were affected by it.

RIP
Vitaly Aikeyenko
Mikhail Balandin
Gennady Churilov
Pavol Demitra
Robert Dietrich
Marat Kalimulin
Alexander Kalyanin
Andrei Kiryukhin
Nikita Klyukin
Stefan Liv
Jan Marek
Sergei Ostapchuk
Karel Rachunek
Ruslan Salei
Maxim Shuvalov
Karlis Skrastins
Pavel Snurnitsyn
Daniil Sobchenko
Ivan Tkachenko
Pavel Trakhanov
Yuri Urychev
Josef Vasicek
Alexander Vasyunov
Alexander Vyukhin
Arten Yarchuk
Brad McCrimmon
Alexander Karpovtsev
Igor Korolev
Yuri Bakhvalov
Aleksandr Belyavev
Nikolai Krivonosov
Yevgeni Kunnov
Vyacheslav Kuznetsov
Vladimir Piskunov
Yevgeni Sidorov
Andrei Zimin
Andrei Solomentsev
Igor Zhivelov
Nadezhda Maksumova
Vladimir Matyushin
Elena Sarmatova
Elena Shavina
Sergey Zhuravlev