PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) – When Eric Jacobson eased aircraft into the skies, his wife Natasha often sat beside him, his co-pilot in the couple’s dual dream of becoming commercial airline pilots.
But their intertwined hopes ended Friday when the plane Eric Jacobson was copiloting crashed into a Leominster, Mass., sheet metal shop, killing Jacobson and five passengers.
Natasha Jacobson, 26, who married Eric a year ago, said the crash has made her terrified of piloting a plane, but she would not be deterred from getting behind the controls again.
“He would not let me give up,” she said. “And if I gave up, I think that would hurt him. He would never let me give up.”
The plane crash Friday also killed New York real estate developer and philanthropist Anthony Fisher, his wife Anne, two interior designers who were renovating the developer’s Martha’s Vineyard vacation home, and the pilot. The Fisher’s 13-year-old daughter was the sole survivor.
At Barrington High School, Eric Jacobson was a math whiz who was also a tiptop athlete, competing on the swim team. He preferred social activities to schoolwork, but wowed teachers and classmates nonetheless.
“His brain could work faster than a calculator,” said his father, Jeffrey Jacobson, 59, of Seekonk, Mass.
Eric Jacobson dashed from one interest to another, and he attended three different colleges. He eventually graduated as a top physical education student at the State University of New York at Cortland, then attended the University of Massachusetts at Amherst for postgraduate studies in biomechanics.
Eric Jacobson’s love of travel led him to jobs that allowed him to see the edges of the earth. He backpacked through Europe and went scuba diving in the Caribbean. He worked on the social staff of a cruise line and as a flight attendant for Northwest Airlines. He met Natasha in Amsterdam.
Close friend Patrick Little, 30, of Bristol, said Jacobson’s all-over-the-map approach was admirable.
“Eric did more in 30 years than I’ll do in my whole life,” Little said. “He fit more into 30 years than most of us will do in a lifetime.”
He eventually found his calling in the cockpit of a plane.
“He never found anything that he really loved doing until he started flying,” Jeffrey Jacobson said.
His pursuit of a commercial pilot license took him to Texas and Arizona for training. And he had moved back to New England about a year ago to do Boston air traffic reports for General Aviation Services, Natasha Jacobson said. He also worked on private jets at an airfield in Bedford, Mass.
On Friday, Eric Jacobson was trying to earn more hours as a co-pilot on a multiengine plane.
The Jacobsons will hold a small service at Shalom Memorial Chapel Tuesday in Cranston.
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