Posted on 07/18/2014 10:09:18 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The American citizen Quinn Lucas Schansman, who was on board Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 when it was shot down over Ukraine on Thursday, had lived in the Bay Area for a while.
Schansman, 19, had dual Dutch-U.S. citizenship, according to the State Department.
Schansman's father, Thomas Schansman, worked as an account executive for the Netherlands Foreign Investment Agency, a company established by the Dutch embassy that had an office in San Mateo.
Quinn Schansman lived in the Bay Area as a kid when his father worked for the embassy. His grandfather said Friday that he is devastated by the news.
"You go through all the phases of mourning," he said. "At the moment it's just morning."
Thomas Schansman appears to have owned property in Menlo Park. His Twitter account shows his current location as Hilversum, Netherlands.
Information on what appears to be Quinn Schansman's Facebook profile shows he studied at the International Business School at Hogeschool van Amsterdam. Facebook photos of Schansman show him hanging out with friends and family.
He was on his way to Bali to meet his family for summer vacation, when the tragedy happened.
"It didn't need to happen," his grandfather said.
A Facebook page belonging to a woman identified as Schansman's girlfriend shows photos of the two of them together, including one posted Thursday. A number of people have left condolence messages on her page.
A friend of Schansman's who went to high school with him told NBC News he was born in New York City but had lived in Netherlands most of his life.
"He was kind," the friend, Fabienne Schriek, said. "He stuck up for you and made you laugh when he saw there was something wrong."
The U.S. Department is in the process of finding out whether more Americans are among the 298 passengers and crew on the flight which took off from Amsterdam.
Ping
I thought there were 23 Americans on the plane. Changing their story already?
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