STEWART AIRPORT – Hudson Valley Honor Flight is heading to Washington D.C. with another planeload of veterans.
Mission number 9 will take off from Stewart International Airport on Oct. 10.
Executive Director Beth Vought said this group will include 84 veterans from three wars. There will be 63 World War II veterans, 19 Korean War veterans and two terminally ill veterans of the Vietnam War.
And on Nov. 11, mission number 10 will take off from Westchester County Airport.
Hudson Valley Honor Flight is the local chapter of a national group whose goal is to give every veteran who wants one a free trip to the nation’s capital to visit memorials to the wars in which they served.
Priority currently is given to World War II veterans, and to veterans who are terminally ill. And as long as they are around, Vought said, “Our top priority will always be World War II veterans.”
But the group has begun to find spaces for Korean War veterans on the flights, too. Vought said they have applications for more than 100 Korean War veterans on file.
Every flight out of Stewart is preceded by a sendoff ceremony, and the public is invited. For the upcoming flight, you’ll need to be at Stewart at 7:30 a.m. on Oct. 10. If you’re not a morning person, there’s also an evening ceremony to welcome the veterans home. The tentative return time for the Oct. 10 flight is 8:30 p.m.
Hudson Valley Honor Flight already is planning its spring flights out of Stewart and Westchester.
“Every few days, I’m getting more applications in the mail,” Vought said.
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