06 June 2024 , 18:36
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A World War II veteran has tragically died just hours before attending an event to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day.
Robert ‘Al’ Persichitti, aged 102, was travelling with a group of other veterans to attend a ceremony in France when he passed away.
He fell ill while travelling by ship in the North Sea and although he was rushed to hospital in Germany by helicopter, he died shortly after.
Robert, from Rochester in New York, served in the Pacific theater during the war and saw the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima by US Marines, a moment that became one of the most iconic images of the conflict.
He’d made a similar trip to visit Iwo Jima in 2019, and when asked to go to Normandy by the National World War II Museum Group he had no hesitation, MailOnline reports.
Robert was member of Honor Flight Rochester, a veteran’s organisation, and its president Richard Stewart told The New York Times that the veteran was not alone when he died as he was with a doctor, listening to his favourite Frank Sinatra song.
Speaking to local media before he left, Robert said his cardiologist had told him to take the trip, despite his history of heart problems.
At the the time of the raising of the flag in Iwo Jima, Robert was a radioman second class on the command ship USS Eldorado, according to an online profile.
He worked in aiding communications for operations in Iwo Jima and in Okinawa, and he ‘broke down’ after revisiting Iwo Jima in 2019.
In 2020, he was named to the New York State Senate’s Veterans Hall of Fame.
Richard Stewart described Robert as ‘fit and upright’ with ‘the complete faculties of someone who would be decades younger. He was really something’.
Following the war, Persichitti became a carpentry high school teacher in Rochester and was known for visiting local schools, giving talks about his experiences in the war.