Relatives attend the burial of Chapecoense soccer team’s late president Sandro Pallaoro, who died in a plane crash in Colombia, in Chapeco, Brazil, Sunday, Dec. 4, 2016.
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On Thursday, row upon row of caskets, many covered with white sheets printed with the logo of the Chapocoense soccer team, filled a Medellin funeral home in preparation for being flown home, as family members of some victims gathered there to say their final goodbyes.
The Brazilian Air Force provided three Hercules cargo planes to fly Nilson and the rest of the team to Chapecó, the small southern Brazilian town they called home.
Following the tragedy, Brazil’s president Michel Tamer declared three days of national mourning.
Cemetery workers prepare burial sites in Chapeco, Brazil, Friday, Dec. 2, 2016, as Colombia begins repatriating the dead from a chartered plane crash.
They will be carried during a funeral procession through Chapeco, ending with a ceremony at the club’s stadium. They joined Brazil’s top flight in 2014 for the first time since the 1970s and made it last week to the Copa Sudamericana final after defeating two of Argentina’s fiercest teams, San Lorenzo and Independiente, as well as Colombia’s Junior.
Columbian pilot pleads for authorization to land due to fuel problems before the plane crash.
Colombia’s civil aviation safety chief, Freddy Bonilla, said the plane disregarded global rules on fuel reserves.
Heavy rain met the arrival of the plane carrying the coffins in Chapeco, the city where the team are based. The team was on its way to the finals of an important South American championship.
Only six people on board survived an impact that left pieces of the fuselage scattered on the sides of a mountain in Colombia, just 30 miles short of their destination.
At least 71 of the passengers on the flight died in the crash. “I can say that God helped my son”.
Other survivors were in various stages of recovery.
Bolivia’s aviation authority suspended the operating licence of charter airline LaMia, which was part-owned by the pilot and two other aviation officials.
“Alex! Angel! David! Where’s my crew?” shouted the visibly disoriented man, as rescuers tried to calm him.
“I spoke with my daddy 10 minutes before the flight took off. Now I can cry,”‘ said Valeria Zampier, Neto’s mother.
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“So if you think you want to do something just get out there and do it because we don’t know what tomorrow brings”.
