Chapecoense Real was on its way to play in the finals of the Copa Sudamericana when disaster struck
The football world mourned after a plane carrying a Brazilian team crashed in the mountains in Colombia, killing 71 people but miraculously leaving six survivors, officials said.
Football legends Pele and Maradona as well as current superstars Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo led tributes to the players of Chapecoense Real, a humble team whose march to glory was cut abruptly short.
Having risen only recently from obscurity, the team was on its way to play in the finals of the Copa Sudamericana, South America's second-biggest club tournament, when disaster struck.
The plane went down about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Medellin, in a remote mountain area called Cerro Gordo.
"The pain is terrible. Just as we had made it, I will not say to the top, but to have national prominence, a tragedy like this happens," club vice-president Ivan Tozzo told Globo SportTV.
"It is very difficult, a very great tragedy."
Colombia's civil aviation authority initially said 75 people were killed, but it later emerged that four people on the passenger manifest had not in fact boarded the plane — a club official, a journalist, the mayor of the team's hometown and the city council president.
"It's one of those things in life. Only God knows why I ended up staying behind," the mayor, Luciano Buligon, told Brazil's TV Globo.
