FLOWERS FLOAT ATOP DEADLY SEA; CANDLELIGHT VIGIL SET FOR TONIGHT.

Byline: Sylvia L. Oliande and David Greenberg  Staff Writers

PORT HUENEME - Touched by the deaths of the 88 people aboard Alaska Airlines Flight 261, Ventura County residents sought Wednesday to express their grief, sharing prayers and thoughts for the victims and their families.

Some have erected makeshift memorials on the beaches in honor of the 88 who died, while others have tossed flowers into the waters off the Port Hueneme pier.

Janine Huarte, 23, of Oxnard arrived with a fellow Oxnard College classmate to throw a dozen roses into the sea, where the MD-83 plunged about 4:20 p.m. Monday.

``We just felt like we wanted to do something to remember the lives that were lost here, especially since it's so close to home,'' Huarte said. ``Roses symbolize life. It's a way of honoring their lives and their families.

``This sort of tragedy makes it difficult to have a traditional burial. Flowers are traditionally brought to a cemetery but here, you can't have that.''

Touched by the tragedy, Port Hueneme resident Kim Gunter has organized a candlelight vigil to begin at 5 p.m. today at the Port Hueneme pier.

``I just felt really touched by the fact that these people had perished. I know that families need a place to go to grieve,'' said Gunter, a 47-year-old dental hygienist.

``We've never had anything like this happen out here,'' she said. ``Everything's always been fun-loving and jovial and happy. This makes us think a lot more about the brevity of life.''

The National Transportation Safety Board is planning a public memorial service for later this week.

In the Hueneme School District, superintendent Robert Fraisse said he was monitoring his campuses daily to see whether students and staffers need emotional support.

Beach Elementary School students have raised the most questions because the campus is closest the crash site.

``The fears that are coming up are things like the helicopters - why there are so many over the children's homes at night - as opposed to the crash itself,'' he said.

``We're checking in with all the principals to monitor the situation every day,'' Fraisse said. ``But we don't want to create a problem. We're trying to maintain business as usual.''

Dr. Margaret Pepe, a psychologist who volunteers with the Red Cross to provide disaster counseling, said the transition in the search - from hope of rescue to recovery of bodies - is an extremely emotional one, a critical time for some family members.

``There is a reluctance on the part of some family members to give up the belief there is hope,'' she said from the Red Cross headquarters in Virginia. ``For some it is a very strong moment of despair. It forces them to give up that part of denial, and some don't make that transition at first.

``For some others, they have moved there intellectually already,'' she added. ``Some of us realize that, even though we're not ready yet, we are going to have to face it and accept it eventually.''

Another movement toward closure for the victims' families, she said, is the site visit they will be making today with the National Transportation Safety Board.

Pepe said this group has, for the most part, been insistent about going to the crash site, wanting to be close to their loved ones one last time.

She said that the experience, while cathartic for some, may create memories that will stay with them for a long time.

``They are exposed to some rather nasty and unattractive remains of the plane,'' she said. ``They smell airplane fuel, see fragments of the foam that made up the seats. They see very graphic reminders of the violence with which their loved ones died.''

But many feel a need to see the wreckage for a sense of closure, of being close to the moment of death, so that they can move on into the next process of grief, Pepe said.

The Red Cross has several dozen mental health workers - licensed psychologists, social workers, mental health counselors, marriage and family therapists, psychiatrists and psychiatric nurses - assigned to help relatives and family members of the crash victims deal with their grief.

Darren Irby, spokesman for the Red Cross, said four California Red Cross chapters, as well as chapters in Seattle and Alaska, are providing emotional support for search teams and the victims' families who have arrived in Ventura County.

He said the mental health workers act as advocates for the family and move with them every step of the way, so the organization usually assigns one worker to each family.

``Clearly this time is one of devastation, and different families go through different cycles of grief,'' Irby said. ``It's important to have one person assigned to a family to have the history of where they're at in the grieving process. Some want a lot of information. Others don't want very much information at all - or at least they don't want a lot of details.''

The mental health worker can get an idea of the family dynamic and history and be better able to help the family members through the process of gathering information needed to identify the bodies.

``It's not really a long list of things they need to do, but one that is challenging for many family members,'' said Pepe, who worked with relatives of passengers on Egypt Air Flight 990, which crashed last Halloween. ``They hadn't thought they were going to have to describe in detail the clothes their loved ones were wearing, what kind of luggage they had. Did they have carry-ons?

``They eventually get down to writing,'' she added. ``And my son was carrying a brown teddy bear that was 18 inches long - they're not prepared for that kind of detail.''

- Staff Writer Amy Raisin contributed to this report.

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Photo: A boat heads out of the Port of Hueneme on Wednesday to retrieve wreckage at sea from Alaska Airlines Flight 261.

Tina Burch/Staff Photographer