D-Day Commemorated at EAA’s B-17 Tour Stop in Seattle
June 16, 2016 - Thirteen World War II veterans gathered to commemorate D-Day as part of EAA’s B-17 tour stop in Seattle, Washington on June 6.
Kerry Edwards, one of the event’s organizers, said they always try to get several B-17 veterans together when Aluminum Overcast is going to be in town. It just so happened this year’s visit fell around the anniversary of D-Day.
“Once we started getting these veterans together, they all wanted to just chat amongst themselves,” he said. “They sat around and traded stories for about an hour and then the media came in so they went through some of it again. Then we took them down, sat them underneath the wing of the airplane and did a couple photoshoots.”
The members of the media who were there got to chat with the veterans during flights in Aluminum Overcast.
“We had two media flights because we had enough media and vets present that we could warrant it,” Edwards said. “They were absolutely blown away by being able to go up in [the B-17]”
Edwards said the highlight of the day was having so many veterans in attendance.
“Thirteen of these guys, all of them in their 90s, with sharp memories and stories to tell,” he said. “We asked each one of these guys ‘Did you participate in D-Day?’ and almost every one of them said yes. [They’re] in varying degrees of health but their minds are sharp. [They] all talked specifically about their D-Day mission and what their part of it was.”
