Inside the arena, it seemed a ghastly coincidence: Just as dignitaries converged in this picturesque city for President Dmitri A. Medvedev’s much-anticipated political conference, Yaroslavl’s elite hockey team waswiped out when its plane crashedleaving a local airport.
But many of the mourners outside dismissed the notion of coincidence, repeating their logic to one another numbly: If the Kremlin had not decided to hold the event in Yaroslavl, the team would have opened the season at home instead of flying to Minsk — or they would have had access to a better plane, or a longer runway. Even so, they sounded more grief-stricken than angry.
“They were our heritage,” said Roma Korchagin, 17, who said he had not missed a home game in three years. “It is a calamity, not just for our city, but for the whole country. Not just for our country, but for all of Europe.”
Amid nationwide mourning, Mr. Medvedev reshuffled his plans for the Global Policy Forum, an annual event he has used to present high-profile initiatives since becoming president.
After visiting the site of the crash, he ordered an overhaul of Russia’s aviation industry, which has been plagued by deadly accidents this year. He said that, in the interests of safety, the state would drop customs duties that have prevented airlines from buying foreign equipment.
“The government will obviously have to make a very difficult decision,” he said. “The integrity of a human life should outweigh any particular considerations, including support for domestic producers.”
It is a measure of the response in Russia that by Thursday afternoon, more than two dozen players had volunteered to transfer to the team, Lokomotiv, in hopes of replenishing its ranks.
Vyacheslav Fetisov, a former N.H.L. player who heads the Kontinental Hockey League, where Lokomotiv plays, said 26 “good quality players,” most of them Lokomotiv veterans, had contacted the league with emotional offers to transfer and reconstitute the devastated team. Later, he announced that the veteran coach Pyotr Vorobyov, who led the team to its first national championship in 1997, had agreed to return to coach the new team.
“They understand what kind of situation they are going to face, what kind of responsibility they will take on their shoulders,” Mr. Fetisov said. “Their wish is to come back. That tells us a lot about the hockey family.”
Mr. Fetisov said he had not been surprised by the public outpouring of grief. “I did not expect any other reaction from my people,” he said.
Witnesses said the Yak-42, a Russian-made, three-engine, single-aisle plane used mostly for domestic flights, failed to rise swiftly enough after takeoff. All but two of the 45 people on board were killed instantly; the single surviving player, Aleksandr Galimov, has burns over 90 percent of his body. A crew member, Aleksandr Sizov, also survived.
Among the dead were athletes recruited from European and North American teams. One was Brad McCrimmon, a Canadian and an N.H.L. veteran who resigned as an assistant coach with the Detroit Red Wings in May to become Lokomotiv’s head coach. Six other former N.H.L. players also died.
On Thursday afternoon, a crowd of about 1,000 mourners marched to the arena, where Mr. Medvedev was hosting the president of Turkey and the secretary general of NATO, among other dignitaries. Mostly young men, and some drinking vodka, they chanted slogans devoted to Mr. Galimov, like “Sasha — you will survive,” and “Galimov, live for the whole team.” They piled flowers in mounds that grew shoulder-high, and unwound Lokomotiv scarves from their necks to lay on a makeshift shrine.
Though the crowd was peaceful, its size and passion were reminiscent of marches that took shape in Moscow late last year, when a group of mourning soccer fans turned their wrath against the police.
On Thursday, riot police officers watched the mourners, but they did not interfere with the demonstration, which continued into the night as people came and went. Among the teenagers, most said the accident could be traced to the Kremlin decision to hold the forum in Yaroslavl, a contention that proliferated over social networking sites.
“It’s the fault of the government, of the people who arranged this trip,” said Alina Khlopontykh, 18. Asked what would come of it, her friend Nina Shagayeva shrugged. “We are simple citizens,” she said. “What can we do against the people who go to a forum like this?”
A larger group of mourners, which formed outside the arena late on Wednesday night, marched past a hotel where many of the guests invited to the forum were staying. As dignitaries were bused back to their hotels after a buffet dinner, security personnel told them to hide their identification badges lest the crowd turn aggressive.http://pnrstatu.blogspot.com