>“This is a time of great sadness for the 101st Airborne Division. The loss of these Soldiers will reverberate through our formations for years to come,” said Maj. Gen. JP McGee, commanding general of the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) and Fort Campbell.
sauce age
https://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/hnwassom.htm
https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2015/12/09/101st-airborne-marks-30-years-since-gander-plane-crash-killed-248-soldiers/
101st Airborne marks 30 years since Gander plane crash killed 248 soldiers
armytimes.com/news/your-army/2015/12/09/101st-airborne-marks-30-years-since-gander-plane-crash-killed-248-soldiers
December 9, 2015
Amy Gallo's husband wasn't supposed to be home from his six-month deployment for another week, but he had managed to get a seat on an earlier flight.
"So when he called me that morning, I was blessed," she said.
That happy phone call would be the last time Gallo would speak to her husband.
The plane carrying Sgt. Richard Nichols and 247 other soldiers, most of them from the 101st Airborne Division's 3rd Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, crashed shortly after taking off from a refueling stop in Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. All 248 soldiers and the plane's eight crew members were killed.
It was Dec. 12, 1985, and the soldiers were on their way home from a peacekeeping deployment in the Sinai.
The crash was the deadliest tragedy to hit the famed Screaming Eagles division in years.
"How do you tell 248 family members their husbands are dead?" Gallo said. "I've never heard so many women yelling and screaming in my life."
This year marks 30 years since that dreadful day, and later this week, soldiers, veterans and surviving family members will gather on Fort Campbell, Kentucky, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the crash.
The Army has marked the anniversary of the crash every year since it happened, but this year is significant, said Col. Brett Sylvia, commander of 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne.
'' "This was the single largest loss of life in a single event in a single day that this division has ever experienced," Sylvia said.''
This week's events will be a chance to bring together veterans and family members, some of whom have not returned to Fort Campbell since the tragic crash, he said.
"Thirty years is a big milestone for them," Sylvia said. "They want to have this reunion. I think they, to some degree, need to know that we still mourn with them this particular event."
Chief Warrant Officer 2 Mickael Cruz, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, and his son, Joshua, look at the Gander memorial tree for Cruz's father at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, last December. Cruz's father, Staff Sgt. Francisco Cruz Salgado, was among 248 Soldiers who lost their lives in a plane crash in Gander, Newfoundland, Dec. 12, 1985, while returning home from a peacekeeping mission in Sinai, Egypt.
Photo Credit: Sgt. 1st Class Eric R. Abendroth/Army