It’s No. 32 for the Freedom Honor Flight out of La Crosse, the nonprofit that takes area veterans to Washington, D.C. for the day to see the war memorials, and Dave Larsen was in studio to talk about it.

Larsen, a veteran himself, said 101 veterans are on Saturday’s flight, where people can go send them off around 6 a.m. from the Colgan Air Service hangar, or — and perhaps more importantly — welcome them home around 9:30-10 p.m. Larsen says that’s important because these are Vietnam veterans, who didn’t get that kind of reception when they came home during the war.

No World War II or Korean War veterans on this flight, where the waiting list in La Crosse is up to 600. But they take two flights a year, with about 100 vets each, so Larsen encourages all veterans to sign up. 

We also talked about what happens when the flight isn’t full with WWII, Korean War or Vietnam vets, and begins getting into Desert Storm-era veterans and everything in between.

Lastly, Larsen notes that Freedom Honor Flight is all self funded and donations it could always use donations to keep sending these vets to DC for free.