When they began to gather up the 132 bodies from USAir Flight 427 today, officials realized there were so many pieces that the grisly task would take days, perhaps weeks. Indeed, they said, some bodies would probably never be identified.

The workers sent by Wayne Tatalovich, the Beaver County coroner, pulled rubber protective boots, like those gardeners wear, over their black coveralls this afternoon before they went into the steep, dense patch of woods where the plane went down. The force of the crash, people who viewed the scene said, had left the victims unrecognizable, with limbs hanging from trees or left in blood-smeared patches up to 200 yards from the point of impact. Everyone who had been to the crash scene Thursday night or this morning was ordered to get hepatitis shots in case they had come in contact with contaminated blood.

"It was a gruesome sight, just gruesome," said Freddy David, the Hopewell Township Police Chief, his eyes red-rimmed with fatigue.

"There were body parts, pieces of seats, luggage for 200 yards," Chief David said. "The biggest piece of the airplane I saw, it was only a little bigger than a car door. I would never have known it was an airplane." Crowded Command Post