By JAKE OFFENHARTZ and DENISE LAVOIE Associated Press
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NEW YORK — One passenger was a caretaker from Jamaica known for her generous portions of plantain porridge. Another was a luxury real estate broker, returning from a family visit with her 2-year-old daughter. The man behind the controls of the plane, last seen slumped in the cockpit, was a skilled aviator with decades of experience.

All four died Sunday when the private jet they were traveling in lost contact with air traffic controllers and crashed into a mountain in rural Virginia. At one point, the unresponsive Cessna Citation flew directly over Washington, prompting the launch of military fighter jets that set off a sonic boom around the capital region.

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As federal investigators continue to piece together what happened, new details are emerging about the people who lost their lives in a tragedy that has left friends and family reeling from the Hamptons to South Florida.

Adina Azarian, 49, was well known in New York’s real estate circles, a luxury broker whose portfolio of exclusive listings were the envy of colleagues, friends said. She conceived her daughter during the pandemic, then hired Evadnie Smith, 56, as a live-in nanny in her East Hampton home.

Known to the family as “Nanny V,” Smith traveled frequently with the mother and daughter, serving as a calming counterweight to Azarian’s occupation of high-stress deal-making.

“Adina used to joke that she’d hired the nanny not just for her daughter, but for herself,” recalled Raphael Avigdor, a longtime friend of the realtor. He said he was so impressed that he hired Smith’s step-sister to care for his mother in Florida.

Smith leaves behind one son in Jamaica, who could not be reached.

Prior to the crash, Azarian, her daughter Aria and Smith were in North Carolina to visit Azarian’s adoptive parents, the prominent Republican donors John and Barbara Rumpel.

Azarian, who grew up in Connecticut and New Hampshire with her biological mother, met the Rumpels by chance as an adult. The couple said Azarian reminded them of their daughter, Victoria, who had died at age 19 in a scuba diving accident.

“We just grew closer and closer and closer together,” John Rumpel recalled.

They felt such a strong connection with Azarian that they decided to adopt her — a process that was finalized when Azarian was 40 years old.