In honor and memory of this day, there was a celebration in downtown Washington yesterday. Many of the remaining survivors of WW2 were there (all in their 90's), at a special invitation only event at the World War 2 Memorial.
There was also a flyover. The Arsenal of Freedom flyover. 70 airplanes that had flown in WW2 flew over Washington DC. They came down the Potomac River, and banked into Washington just past the Lincoln Memorial, flew down the mall, swung past Nationals Stadium, and then flew out. Some airplanes went back to Dulles Airport, where they are to be on display at the Udvar Hazy Museum. (the Smithsonian Museum that is not on the mall). The rest flew back to their various home airports.
Unless if you are from this area, I don't know if you can appreciate the enormity of the planning that went into this event. Since 9/11 there has been a strict no-fly order in place over Washington DC and the National Mall. Reagan National Airport and Bolling Air Force Base are both located on the Potomac River. The pilots landing at National regularly come down the Potomac River to land, using the landmarks on the river as their guideposts to banking, turning, and landing.
Dulles airport is not that far down the river, and was not only the rendezvous air space for the planes, it is the airport that the planes going on display at Udvar Hazy were to use.
So, shutting down the air space for the hour that the planes would be flying over DC involved shutting down all arrivals and departures at National, and awareness of the airplanes at Dulles. Both airports had to be ready to allow planes with mechanical issues to land during this time.
Organizing this was no small feat.
I had a harebrained scheme to head down there yesterday. Actually, I've kind of been planning this for months now, since I first heard news of the flyover, but yesterday morning, it seemed like not so good of an idea, but I had already passed the point of no return.
Middle son has no classes on Fridays. His semester ends on Tuesday, and finals begin the next day.
So, we laid our plans and headed into town. We had decided to drive in and find a parking space. With my gimpy knee, I know I can walk some, but I was concerned about the amount of walking and standing that would be involved with a ride on Metro.
Shockingly enough, we found free parking. And it wasn't that far off from where I had thought we'd park!
We hiked the mile and a half down the river to what we thought was a good spot. We knew the planes were flying in at 1,000 feet, and we had researched the route pretty thoroughly. We found a spot within site of the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Memorial Bridge that afforded us a really good view of Roslyn and points upriver. We watched as the boats and yachts came upriver and dropped anchor around where we were, as well as just North of the bridge, adjacent to the Lincoln Memorial. We watched people fill the bridge, and people walk past us, and people line the bank of the river across from us, but surprisingly, only 12 people were within site of us. I was more than a little concerned that the planes might bank just a little too far to the north of us, and we would lose them in the tree line.
Anxiously, we awaited the arrival of the airplanes. Everyone strained their eyes, looking for the first dots to appear over the horizon.
As the majestic forms appeared above the highrise buildings upriver, a roar from across the river reached us. We looked up to see the most magnificent site. 4 airplanes flew slowly downriver, emitting a low pitch rumble that reached down into your soul. I can't imagine how terrifying the rumble of thousands of those engines were as they approached cities under cover of darkness for midnight bombing runs.
And then, the planes flew towards us. They banked inland and flew directly over our heads and into Washington. For an hour, we watched, awestruck, as these birds that had won the war flew over us and into the city.
By God, they were beautiful.
When it was all over, we stood there, awestruck. People slowly stood up, and walked away. The silence in the air around us was palpable. Middle child and I stood there for quite some time, watching the planes circle back out of the city, and breaking away to fly off in different directions.
"The romance of the old planes," he said. "No airplanes now are as sexy as those airplanes were."
I did take some pictures yesterday while we were out. I don't have a lot. I was using my phone, so the quality isn't great, but I did want to share what I do have:
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| The Jefferson Memorial. We parked not too far from here. What a gorgeous day! |
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| Along the Potomac River. Those highrises are in Virginia. The Pentagon is directly across from us. The Lincoln Memorial is just to the right of that bridge. The Washington Monument is to our right. There were only 12 people along the river bank with us. |
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I've included a link to live coverage from our local DC/Baltimore radio station below. They have some fantastic footage, photos, and video. BTW, if you look at the pictures of the National Mall, keep in mind that we were on the river bank with 12 other people. We found the right spot!
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