“Honor Flight” is a program that flies – free of charge – US military veterans from their homes to Washington D.C. to visit the memorials. Right now it’s focused on WWII vets, and vets of other wars with terminal illnesses; as time goes by, it is supposed to transition to Korea, Viet Nam, and so on.
The Wikipedia page describes the history of the project thusly:
The Honor Flight Network is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which works as an umbrella organization with local chapters and various subgroups. The network was conceived by Earl Morse, a physician assistant and retired Air Force captain. Morse worked in a Department of Veterans Affairs clinic in Springfield, Ohio, where he saw many patients who were WWII veterans. After the National WWII Memorial in Washington was completed in 2004, he asked many of his veteran patients if they were going to see it, and most said yes. “I would see my World War II veterans some three, six months later,” Morse said, “and I’d ask them if they’d gone to see it. Three hundred of them, and not one of them had been to it. Reality set in. They were never going.”[5] Morse offered to fly with two veterans to Washington to see the memorial, and after seeing them break down and cry and graciously accept the offer, he pitched his idea to a local aeroclub of 300 private pilots at a local Air Force base, proposing that the pilots would pay for the flights for the veterans to Washington and personally escort them around the city. Eleven volunteered, and the network was formed; by 2005, a board was formed, funds were raised, and volunteers had joined.
The first honor flight took place in May 2005, when six small planes flew 12 veterans to Washington. Due to high participation, the program began using commercial flights. At the end of 2005, the program had transported 137 veterans to the memorial. The program expanded into areas not serviced by commercial airlines in 2006 when a group in Henderson, North Carolina called HonorAir chartered a US Airways flight.[2] The Springfield group and HonorAir soon merged to form the Honor Flight Network.[5] Honor Flight Network says that as of November 2010 it has transported 63,292 veterans of WWII, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War to Washington.
Clearly, in a relatively short span of years it has gone from a small idea to a very big one. This is gratifying… shows the power of good ideas in the private marketplace, to bring something good to some people who deserve it.
Also gratifying: the response of regular folks to Honor Flights. In march I flew to D.C. and back, the first time I’ve flown in several years (2008, I think). And I was reminded why I haven’t flown: these days, flying sucks. It’s expensive, annoying, time consuming (and luggage consuming, as I found out), and just plain intrusive, with scans and Xrays and gropings and what all. Airports are full of people who are reasonably described as “stressed out.” It’s the perfect breeding ground for bad feelings. But then this happens:
[youtube Oa-H_EIfjoc]
Awesome.