Hundreds Mourn Club Fire Dead; Bodies to Be Airlifted to Honduras

Hundreds of mourners, many weeping, others calling for revenge, offered their prayers at a funeral home Wednesday for 17 victims of the city’s deadliest fire in 79 years.

Officials, meanwhile, began preparations for a grim airlift of the dead to their Honduran homeland. The Red Cross has asked the New York National Guard to help transport the bodies, an aide to Gov. Mario M. Cuomo said.

A funeral Mass at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church drew 1,500 people, and 1,000 others who could not get in stood outside the church.

Earlier, outside the Bronx funeral home across the street from St. Joseph’s, the street was crowded with people waiting to pay their respects. The dead were among 87 people killed early Sunday inside the Happy Land social club.

Three women fainted as the crowd waited to enter.

Jose Alvarez, mourning his brother Denny, 22, left the Rivera Funeral Home sobbing.

On the steps of the church, Denny’s father, Pedro, tearfully vented his rage at Julio Gonzalez, 36, the man accused of setting the fatal fire in a quarrel with an ex-girlfriend.

“They ought to take him and give him a public hanging,” he said.

Earlier in the day, family members of the victims met with American Red Cross officials at a public school near the burned-out red brick building to receive the belongings each victim carried or wore when the fire struck.

Outside the school, Carlos Pena clutched a manila envelope that held a watch, a set of keys, and some cash--things his brother Eli, 26, had with him early Sunday at the doomed Happy Land club.

The watch came with Eli from Honduras, and Carlos said the timepiece would now be his. “It means a lot, a reminder,” he said.