ROANOKE, Va. – Heroes will soon take to the streets of downtown Roanoke for the annual Veterans Day Parade.
The 13th annual Virginia’s Veterans Parade kicks off next Saturday, Nov. 11 at 11 a.m., and this year the Star City is being nationally recognized.
“We were thrilled to receive a recognition underneath the Veterans Affairs Department, so they have what’s called a Veterans Day committee that has selected us as well as 33 other sites across the United States as an official observant site for Veterans Day,” Daniel Wickham, President of Roanoke Valley Veterans Council Inc. said.
You can join veterans and other community members to honor the men and women who served in the military. Both Campbell Ave. and Jefferson Street will be closed for the parade.
“So far we have 64 units participating in the parade so we’ll have anything from corvettes and mustangs to horses to motorcycle riders, marching bands, as well as VMI corps of cadets or I mean the Virginia Tech corps of cadets will be here also,” Wickham said.
He said this year they are expecting a big turnout both in person and those watching live.
“Most years we get on average between 3,000 to 5,000 in attendance, some years we’ve had more, some we’ve had less. It just depends on the weather,” Wickham said.
In recent years, fans got to see a military flyover, and while that isn’t in the cards this year, Wickham said they are working on an alternative.
“This year we were unable to secure our military flyover,” Wickham said. “We are currently working on other avenues to arrange some kind of flyover; we’re hoping those come to fruition. However, given the current state of affairs around the world our military operations have been put on mission-ready status.”
If you can’t make it downtown, you can catch all the parade festivities on WSLS 10.