More than 100,000 fans gathered at the Chapecoense football club’s stadium on Saturday as bodies of the victims of an air disaster that almost wiped out the team were returned home.

Residents of the Brazilian city of Chapeco draped their homes and businesses in the team’s signature green and black as a mark of respect for the 71 people killed when the plane they were travelling on crashed on Monday night.

The team had been flying with 21 journalists to the Colombian city of Medellin to play the biggest match in their history – the final of the Copa Sudamericana.

But just miles from the airport the pilot of the chartered BAe 146 plane radioed air controllers to say he was running out of fuel, before the plane’s electrics failed and it smashed into a hillside in the Andes.

Only six people survived, including just three members of the Chapecoense side. Fans have been keeping vigil at its stadium, where more than 20,000 people joined family and friends of the victims on Wednesday night to pay tribute to those killed.

A mass was held in the centre of the pitch as fans sang club anthems and wept while holding candles in the stands.

Soldiers carry coffins of Chapecoense Real footballers who were killed in a plane crash in Colombia into their home stadium in Brazil on 3 December (AFP/Getty Images)

On Saturday, the victims' bodies were brought home on a Colombian air force transport plane, with their coffins unloaded in front of mourners at the city's airport. Soldiers formed a guard of honour at a ceremony led by by Michel Temer, the Brazilian President, who bestowed posthumous honours on the dead.

The 50 coffins were then transported to the club's stadium, where 20,000 people were crammed into the stands and many times that number outside to watch them placed beneath tents on the pitch.

The tops of a row of tents formed a banner emblazoned with words from the club’s anthem. “In happiness and in the most difficult hours,” it said, “you are always a winner.”

“We’re still waiting for our heroes to return,” 25-year-old fan Sidnei de Oliveira Dias told Reuters. “We still can’t believe it. Though now we know they’re never coming back.”

In response to outpourings of support from soccer fans and clubs around the globe, Chapecoense has hung a huge black banner from the outer wall of its stadium.

Chapecoense Real Tribute Show all 11 1 /11 Chapecoense Real Tribute Chapecoense Real Tribute Flowers hang from a soccer net at the Arena Conda stadium in Chapeco, Brazil AP Chapecoense Real Tribute Supporters of Brazilian football team Chapecoense take part in a vigil at Conda Arena Rex Features Chapecoense Real Tribute People surround a church during a mass in memoriam of the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real killed in a plane crash in the Colombian mountains, in Chapeco, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute Fans of Chapecoense soccer team attend a mass at the Santo Antonio Cathedral in Chapeco, Brazil Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute A boy sits alone on the stands during a tribute to the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute Supporters of the Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense gather at the Arena Conda Arena in Chapeco, Brazil EPA Chapecoense Real Tribute People surround a church during a mass in memoriam of the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute Fans pays tribute to the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute Fans pay tribute to the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense Real who were killed in a plane accident in the Colombian mountains, at the club's Arena Conda stadium in Chapeco, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute Players of the Chapecoense were among 81 people on board the doomed flight that crashed into mountains in northwestern Colombia, in which officials said just six people were thought to have survived, including three of the players. Chapecoense had risen from obscurity to make it to the Copa Sudamericana finals scheduled for Wednesday against Atletico Nacional of Colombia Getty Chapecoense Real Tribute People work at the Desbravador or Pioneer Monument, symbol of the city, which is pictured with black stripes in tribute to players of Chapecoense soccer team in Chapeco, Brazil Reuters

“We looked for one word to thank all the kindness and we found many,” it reads, followed by the words “thank you” in more than a dozen languages.

Reports in Brazilian media that the plane, which circled outside Medellin for 16 minutes while another aircraft made an emergency landing, had barely enough fuel for the flight from Bolivia have outraged relatives of the victims.

The Bolivian President, Evo Morales, pledged to take “drastic measures” to determine what caused the crash. The country has suspended airline LaMia’s operating licence and replaced the national aviation authority’s management.

Brazilian media, citing an internal document, reported that an official at Bolivia’s aviation agency had urged the airline to come up with an alternative route after calculating that the journey of four hours and 22 minutes was the same length as the plane’s maximum flight range.