Devastated city buries president of Chapecoense soccer club

A Brazilian footballer who survived Monday’s devastating plane crash in Colombia is recovering and could return to football, according to his father.

Sandro Pallaoro was on the plane that crashed nearly a week ago as the club was travelling to Colombia to play the first of two games to determine the Copa Sudamericana champion – the No. 2 club tournament in Latin America.

The disaster killed 19 players from Chapecoense football club and all of its coaching stuff. The dead were honoured Saturday at Chapeco’s stadium, with burials taking place across the country.

The city embraced the trajectory of Chapecoense, the team that rose from the fourth to the first division of Brazilian soccer in five years.

Brazilian President Michel Temer and Gianni Infantino, the president of the world soccer governing body Federation Internationale de Football Association, are also expected to take part in the event.

Brazilian President Michel Temer will attend a ceremony at the Chapeco airport after the coffins arrive, but he will not be at the wake in the stadium, his office said.

(AP Photo/Renata Brito). Paper cranes adorn the gates of the stadium Arena Conda, home of the Chapecoense Brazilian soccer team, in Chapeco, Brazil, Friday, Dec. 2, 2016.

The coffins, covered with white flags bearing the shield of the team from Chapeco, were received on the airfield by members of the Colombian Air Force on Friday, reports Efe.

Funeral honors got under way here Saturday in Brazil for the members of the Chapecoense soccer club who died in a plane crash in northwestern Colombia earlier this week.

There were just six survivors – two Bolivian crew members, a journalist and three players en route to the Copa Sudamericana final, the biggest game in the club’s history.

The other plane crash victims – Brazilians, Bolivians, a Paraguayan and a Venezuelan – were flown home Thursday and Friday.

Some 100,000 people are expected to attend. “We are sending our condolences to Foursquare President Mario Oliviera on behalf of the USA and Global Foursquare Church family”.

“We looked for one word to thank all the kindness and we found many”, it said, followed by the words “thank you” in more than a dozen languages.

Fans react as the coffin of one of the victims of the plane crash in Colombia is carried into the Ar …

The unsung club’s fairytale season was cut tragically short Monday night when the charter plane flying them to their next match ran out of fuel and smashed into the mountains outside Medellin, Colombia.

Tens of thousands of people braved heavy rain in Chapeco, Brazil, for a memorial ceremony honouring the victims of a plane crash, including the town’s football team.

The father of Chapecoense defender Filipe Machado was among the relatives criticizing the pilot.

Ivan Tozzo, the acting president of the club who did not make the trip to Medellin, told fans the club would continue and reminded them that “it was here on this field where this club fought the good fight”.