The emotions were rawest six stories below ground. It was there that family members lingered for more than two hours after the conclusion of yesterday's official ceremony, turning the floor of the World Trade Center itself into a memorial. They knelt on the dirt and gathered stones into piles, planting flowers or flagsticks in the center. They piled flowers upon photographs upon candles upon all manner of personal mementoes, in one last collective effort at memorializing their loved ones. "It was a little overwhelming," said Bryne Boltri of Titusville, N.J., who lost his cousin, firefighter Paul Gill of Engine 54 in Manhattan, in the collapse. Paramedics applied oxygen to those sobbing violently and uncontrollably, their breathing made worse by the clouds of dirt being whipped up. "There was a lot of tears down there, a lot of emotion," said Boltri's wife, Elizabeth. "That's a lot of people's graveyard down there." For most it was their first time in the gaping cavity where the trade center once stood. With the remains of just half the dead identified, venturing into the pit was as close as the families could physically get to their lost loved ones. The slow descent into the pit began at 9:04 a.m., when family members began peeling away from the stage area and slowly, quietly filed down the enormous six-story ramp into the trade center bathtub. At the top of the ramp, volunteers handed out multi-hued roses. At the bottom, an honor guard consisting of police, fire, Port Authority police, EMS, sanitation and various other workers formed an enormous human circle. Inside the circle, on a ring-shaped wooden platform, family members inscribed messages, taped pictures and newspaper clippings and laid tokens of remembrance. Some knelt down and collected dirt and rocks into empty water bottles. "To us it's like a sacred ground right now," said Patricia Tate of the Bronx, who lost her sister, Carol Rabalais. "A day like today, a lot of us wish we had a body, or a grave that you could go to and visit." Martin Suarez, whose brother Benjamin, 35, was among the lost from FDNY Ladder 21, made the emotional trip down in his wheelchair. "I just wanted to come down here and feel where my brother spent the last moments of his life trying to save the lives of others," Suarez said. In the laying of flowers inside the circle, organizers hoped to form a symbolic wreath. The mementoes will be collected by city officials, preserved and could be incorporated into a permanent memorial. It was unclear how exactly they will be preserved. In the afternoon, family members returned to the pit to shake hands with President George W. Bush and the first lady, Laura, who mingled for two hours. His presence calmed many, people said. But it was the morning's ceremony that seemed to mean the most. As for the dust clouds, Veronica Velez, who payed respects to her cousin, Jennifer de Jesus, 23, said the clouds were symbolic. "We are mortal people made of dust, and the wind was carrying the dust up all around us," she said. "It was fitting and beautiful." Staff writers Curtis L. Taylor and Joshua Robin contributed to this story.

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