Local Korean War vets take part in Honor Flight to D.C.

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Bill Erickson and Robert Medina joined a host of fellow veterans May 20-22, in the week before Memorial Day, to commemorate the history of their country, as well as the wars in which they fought.

Erickson, 83, and his daughter, Kathleen Lombardy of Port Townsend, traveled with Medina, 84, a Chimacum resident, to Washington, D.C., as part of the nonprofit Honor Flight program.

Since 2005, Honor Flights have transported more than 159,000 U.S. military veterans to the memorials in the nation’s capital for free.

Robert Medina served in the Navy from 1952 to 1956, and found out about Honor Flight through his son Louis, another Navy veteran, who saw the program promoted through a show on Netflix.

Erickson served in the Navy from 1951 to 1955, and heard about the program through his nephew, also a retired sailor. He signed up for an Honor Flight a couple of years ago, but had forgotten that he had done so until his trip was approved for this year.

WWII vets have priority

“[Honor Flight has] a bit of a backlog, so they’re trying to take care of folks in the order in which they served,” said Lombardy, who works at the Jefferson Healthcare clinic at 934 Sheridan. “World War II veterans have priority, then Korean War vets.”

Although the program pays for the veterans’ expenses, with escorts such as Lombardy making donations to accompany them, she sees the fellowship that the program fosters as its greatest benefit.

“He and I could have gone and seen the memorials ourselves, but then, we wouldn’t have been surrounded by his fellow veterans,” Lombardy said. “With Honor Flights, they get treated like the heroes they are.”

Lombardy noted that a number of people volunteer to escort veterans they don’t even know, simply to provide them with companionship, and care, if necessary; several of the volunteers she saw were nurses.

Although Lombardy describes her relationship with her father as close, there were still aspects of his military experience that she hadn’t fully grasped before their joint trip.

“Dad served on board a ship during the Korean War,” Lombardy said. “It wasn’t a battleship, but it still took some hits. I didn’t hear a lot of stories about battles, from him or the other guys there, but they all knew the history of each battle.”

Both Erickson and Medina served on destroyers; Erickson on the USS Hamner (DD-718), and Medina on the USS O’Brien (DD-725). Both men worked on the boilers in their respective ships’ engine rooms.

“Nowadays, you can start up a ship with the turn of a key and the push of a button,” Erickson said, laughing. “It took some time to light up the engines back then. When we were running with the aircraft carriers along the Korean coastline, we had four boilers running.”

JOIN AND SEE THE WORLD

As with Erickson’s ship, Medina’s ship conducted watches along the 38th parallel north, the boundary that divides Korea, and Medina credits the Navy with living up to its recruitment motto of “Join the Navy, see the world.”

“Before boot camp in San Diego, I’d grown up in Trinidad, Colorado, and had never been more than 38 miles from my hometown,” Medina said. “I always try to remember the fun times I had in the fleet, even though some of the other times were bad.”

Medina and his shipmates experienced some “rough rides” in stormy seas, and kept their sanity thanks to their commanding officers’ loosening of a handful of minor military regulations, allowing some of the sailors to wear cowboy boots while the ship was underway.

“They were little things that helped us keep our sanity,” said Medina, whose ship, like Erickson’s, received weapon fire while patrolling the 38th.

“We looked for targets of opportunity,” Erickson said. “That basically meant, if we saw something, we shot at it. Of course, a lot of times, we got shot at first. We heard guns go off all the time, but they didn’t have the long-range targeting for their shots that we did. Because we were young guys, we could even fall asleep to rounds of fire in the berthing compartment.”

“The sides of our ship took shrapnel, but I made it through without a scratch,” Medina said. “I was very lucky.”

Medina still remembers fellow service members who weren’t so lucky, such as a pilot in his battle group who attempted to land on the aircraft carrier and wound up going into the water instead.

“We never did find him,” Medina said. Medina did find plenty of fellow Korean War veterans, as did Erickson, during their visit in Washington, D.C.

‘TIN-CAN SAILORS’

“It was the best thing that could have happened to me at this time in my life, when I’m looking back and thinking about the duty that I did,” Medina said. “I was very proud to talk to veterans of World War II through Korea. I even got to meet a few former tin-can sailors like myself. One old Army guy had been a tank driver, and he knew every tank you could think of.”

Erickson was reminded of the beach parties that took place whenever his ship made its way back from deployment, stopping at the Midway Islands and Hawaii along the way.

“Once you got to Hawaii, you could get fresh milk and vegetables again,” Erickson said. “The ocean air was so clean that I could smell the flowers of Hawaii before we got there. The mainland United States always smelled like freshly plowed earth to me.”

Erickson had three deployments, lasting from eight to nine months each, but like his daughter, he’d never been to “the other Washington” until the Honor Flight program. While Lombardy availed herself of every opportunity to learn more about “The Forgotten War” in Korea, Erickson was visiting the Lincoln and FDR memorials, among other landmarks.

“When we went to witness the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, I was apparently supposed to stand with the other veterans,” Erickson said, chuckling. “My daughter ratted me out to them.”

VETERANS ACKNOWLEDGED

Although Erickson had not wanted to call attention to himself, he and his fellow veterans were acknowledged by the guards at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, albeit in an exceedingly subtle fashion.

“They’re not allowed to acknowledge anyone except veterans, and even then, they’re still not allowed to speak, except for the one sergeant,” Erickson said. “So instead, they softly scuff their shoes. We were told to listen for it beforehand.”

Between the guards, the escort of police cars and motorcycle club members – “We didn’t have to stop for anything” – and the cheering crowds of “thousands” of onlookers at the airports, Erickson confessed that the Honor Flight experience was “very moving,” and made it “hard to keep from bawling.”

“What blew me away was when an ambassador from [South] Korea put medals around our veterans’ necks, and told them that they were the forgotten heroes who had helped keep his country free,” Lombardy said. “The Honor Flight program is such a wonderful organization.”

“I hope other Korean War veterans apply for Honor Flights of their own,” Erickson said. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Even on our flight back, there was a lot of eye wiping.”

“We were very well-treated throughout the event,” Medina said. “I like the idea of vets being remembered, whether they’re fallen or still alive, because we did our duty. I think this country is on the right track to honoring that.”