Air Force Memorial

On October 14, 2006, President George W. Bush dedicated the new US Air Force Memorial in Arlington during a ceremony on a promontory next to Arlington National Cemetery. In December 1993, President William Clinton signed the bill authorizing th memorial. The following year, the site known as Arlington Ridge was selected.
The monument is located on the former grounds of the Navy Annex near the Pentagon and Arlington National Cemetery. It was design by James Ingo Freed for the US Air Force Memorial Foundation. He also designed the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. The three memorial spires range from 201 feet to 270 feet and resemble the contrails of aircraft performing a precision “bomb Burst” maneuver. The fourth contrail of the maneuver is missing suggesting the Missing Man formation traditionally used by the Air Force in funeral flyovers.
The pedestrian approach to the memorial had 4 eight foot bronze statues representing the US Air Force Honor Guard and is sculpted by Zenos Frudakis. It also includes a contemplative wall of free-standing glass with the images of four F-16s flying in the Missing Man formation. Two inscription walls are located at each end of the central lawn. One wall bears the names of Air Force recipients of the Medal of Honor and the other bears inspiration quotations about the Air Forces’ three core values: integrity, service, and excellence.
About 30,000 people attended the dedication ceremony that day. Since then, the Air Force Memorial has hosted more than 300 military ceremonies, weddings, funerals and other events. On Friday evenings in the summer, the US Air Force Band held concerts there. It is now part of the Arlington National Cemetery complex.