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WWII military airplanes in region Thursday and Friday

About 70 World War II military planes will fly over the region Thursday and Friday, Sept. 24-25.

With most starting from the Culpeper and Manassas airports, they will participate in Friday’s “Arsenal of Democracy Flyover” to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the war’s end.

Fighters, bombers and other aircraft will assemble west of Leesburg and fly at low altitude over the Potomac River to Washington, D.C., between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. Friday.

The D.C. flyover will feature 19 historically sequenced formations representing the war’s major battles and ending with the “Missing Man Formation.”

The aircraft also will participate in a rehearsal flight Thursday in the vicinity of Warrenton, Culpeper, Manassas, Leesburg and Winchester.

“Sentimental Journey,” the B-17 bomber that recently visited the Warrenton-Fauquier Airport, has returned for the celebration.

The flyover will pay tribute to those who served in uniform and to those who made victory in World War II possible, including the contributions of the manufacturing sector. U.S. aircraft manufacturers engaged in the greatest industrial effort in history. They went from producing a handful of aircraft to thousands coming off of assembly lines. Often rival aircraft companies worked together to boost the production for men and women fighting abroad. In 1944 alone, the United States produced 114,000 combat planes.

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