In June, I attended the 75th D-Day commemorations in Normandy,
France, with 69 members of the WWII Airborne Demonstration Team
(ADT). For the better part of two years, ADT had been planning for this
once-in-a-lifetime event. Afterall, ADT’s mission is to remember, honor,
and serve our veterans using WWII Airborne heritage to keep history
alive for new generations. And, on a somber note, the 75th remem-
brance would be the last when a small number of veterans would still
be able to attend. By the 80th D-Day commemorations in 2024, almost
all WWII veterans would have passed. There was no question that ADT
would be at the 75th!
In 2014, 18 ADT members attended the 70th D-Day commemoration.
A handful of C-47/DC-3 variant aircraft and about 100 parachutists
assembled and jumped that week into the historic drop zones inland
of Utah Beach, one of two of the American landing beaches in 1944.
The 2014 event, organized by Peter Braun, was such a success that
Peter created Daks Over Normandy (DAKs) in 2016. The DAKs mission
was to get as many C-47/DC-3 variant aircraft and parachutists as
possible to fly across the English Channel and drop into France to
honor those that gave so much 75 years ago.Parachutists over the Sannerville drop zone.