Family, friends and the public are invited to attend the annual Gander Memorial Wreath Laying Ceremony in Hopkinsville Thursday afternoon.
The event, hosted by the Christian County Chamber of Commerce Military Affairs, will be held at 1:00 p.m. at the corner of U.S. 41-A and Pennyrile Parkway to honor the 248 Fort Campbell soldiers and eight crew members who lost their lives when Arrow Air Flight 1285 crashed in Gander, Newfoundland shortly after takeoff on the morning of December 12, 1985. The soldiers, primarily assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, were returning from a six-month peacekeeping mission in the Sinai Peninsula.
In addition, the public is invited to attend the 34th Anniversary Gander Memorial remembrance ceremony Thursday morning at 10:00 at Fort Campbell. Army officials say this will be the first ceremony held at the recently relocated memorial.
According to Fort Campbell officials, the memorial consists of two monuments and 256 Canadian sugar maple trees to honor the memory of the soldiers and crew members.
Officials say the original memorial, also on Fort Campbell, was relocated earlier this year after the trees’ root systems began growing together, raising concerns about the long-term future of the memorial. This prompted officials to make the decision to relocated the monuments to the new site.
Fort Campbell officials say Mrs. Janice Johnston Nikkel, a Canadian citizen, who pledged money she earned from babysitting to the creation of the original tree park, will return to Fort Campbell to help dedicate the new memorial Thursday morning.
