Photo taken on April 18, 2019 shows a memorial service at the Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas, the United States. About 1,000 people gathered on Thursday for a memorial service to celebrate the life of retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Richard "Dick" E. Cole at an Air Force base in southern Texas, the United States. Cole, who was the final surviving member of the famed Doolittle Tokyo Raiders of World War II, passed away in San Antonio, about 310 km west of downtown Houston, on April 9 at the age of 103. U.S. Air Force held a memorial service at the Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph on Thursday, April 18, the 77th anniversary of the Doolittle Raid led by then Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, with whom Cole copiloted. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)
SAN ANTONIO, the United States, April 18 (Xinhua) -- About 1,000 people gathered on Thursday for a memorial service to celebrate the life of retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Richard "Dick" E. Cole at an Air Force base in southern Texas, the United States.
Cole, who was the final surviving member of the famed Doolittle Tokyo Raiders of World War II, passed away in San Antonio, about 310 km west of downtown Houston, on April 9 at the age of 103.
U.S. Air Force held a memorial service at the Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph on Thursday, April 18, the 77th anniversary of the Doolittle Raid led by then Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, with whom Cole copiloted.
"Our family is profoundly saddened by the loss of our Dad. Beyond his place in history, he was a father that relished his family and husband that deeply loved our mom," Lt. Col. Cole's son Rich Cole said. "We witnessed his sacrificial love every day as he poured himself into our family. He taught us how to laugh and see joy in almost all of life's circumstances."
Several Air Force leaders including Heather Wilson, Secretary of the Air Force, and General David Goldfein, Chief of Staff of the Air Force, attended the memorial.
In a show of honor prior to the memorial, hundreds of Airmen lined Harmon Drive, the main entrance to the base, to salute the Cole family as they entered base. The national flags were flown at half-staff at all Joint Base San Antonio locations.
At the memorial, Aaron Cole, a grandson of the late Lt. Col. Richard Cole sang the national anthem.
In addition to this tribute, there were the missing man formation and serval static aircraft on display.
The Doolittle Raid, planned and led by U.S. Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle on April 18, 1942, was an air raid by the United States on seven Japanese cities including capital Tokyo during World War II, as retaliation for the attack on U.S. Pearl Harbor.
The Pearl Harbor attack was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii on December 7, 1941. The attack led to the United States' formal entry into World War II the next day.
Being one of the 80 U.S. Air Force personnel who took part in the Doolittle Raid, Cole was Jimmy Doolittle's co-pilot in the lead plane that bombed Tokyo. Running out of fuel on their return, they ditched off the Chinese coast, and were later helped by Chinese troops.
The last Doolittle Raider will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, a U.S. military cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia.
