Prague pays respects to hockey players killed in Russia plane crash

Thousands turned out for a remembrance service in Prague on Sunday marking the death of three Czech hockey players killed in a plane crash in Russia last week.Jan Marek, Karel Rachunek and Josef Vasicek were killed when a passenger plane carrying a Russian ice hockey team to a season-opening match crashed after takeoff from a provincial airport on last Wednesday, killing 43 people.People lit candles and lay flowers at the memorial, placed at the square since the Russian tragedy. The stage was decorated with players photographs and dresses was filled by flowers of their friends and fans.The Czech Ice Hockey Union decided that their dresses with numbers 4, 15 and 63 will be excluded from the representation and will be used never again.Union Chairman Tomas Kral paid tribute to the players, after observing a minutes silence. Let me thank our boys for how amazing and irreplaceable ice hockey players they where, how amazing and irreplaceable friends they were to us, how amazing and irreplaceable people they were, he said.Czech ice hockey player Jiri Schlegr expressed the helplessness many felt after the tragedy. This is a big lost for all of us, what is there to say? All we can do is condole to their families.After the memorial ceremony the holly mass was celebrated in the Tyn Cathedral at the Old Town Square.