D-Day 80th anniversary celebration of Normandy invasion

COLLEVILLE-SUR-MER, France — At 8:34 a.m. local time (3:34 a.m. ET), President Joe Biden boarded Air Force One for the short flight from Paris to Normandy.

Traveling with him were a clutch of officials including Secretary of State Antony Blinken and John Kerry, a campaign adviser who was the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004.

Biden arrived in Paris Wednesday and spent much of the day preparing for a pair of speeches he’ll deliver this week.

He is scheduled to head back to Paris after his speech today and then, on Friday, he’ll travel to Pointe du Hoc for another, which will draw on the inspirational story of U.S. Army Rangers who scaled sheer cliffs to gain a toehold in France in the face of withering German fire.

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COLLEVILLE-SUR-MER, France — A chilly morning in Normandy was slowly giving way to warm sunshine hours before the ceremony at the American Cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer, where President Joe Biden will give a speech alongside a military flyover.

Later, an international ceremony on Omaha Beach will be attended by 25 world leaders, including Biden, as well as around 4,500 guests.

The sheer magnitude of this event has been clear in recent days, namely from the number of blue-light convoys seen speeding around the highways in this rural corner of northwest France.

These outriders and blacked-out state vehicles have had to weave in and out of the World War II-era jeeps (top speed 30 mph) that have otherwise dominated the roads and winding lanes of the dense Normandy countryside, the same dense “bocage” of fields and hedgerows that troops had to fight through 80 years ago today.

As dawn broke on Gold Beach in Maj. Trevor Macey-Lillie played the Scottish lament “Highland Laddie” on the bagpipes on Gold Beach in Normandy.

The time-honored tradition recreates the moment that thousands of British troops disembarked onto French beaches.

Macey-Lillie began in a landing craft utility before he was driven up the beach in a DUKW amphibious vehicle.

It’s almost 80-years on, but Marie Bastien said the memory of the American fighter plane being shot down near her village in northern France remains as vivid as ever.

“I still see it, as if it was yesterday,” Bastien, 94, told NBC News in French last month before widespread celebrations across France on June 6 for the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. 

Bastien was just 14 when 1st Lt. Paul Chaufty’s fighter was shot out of the sky, but since then she has worked hard to keep his memory alive with her daughter Mireille and her wider network of friends and family. 

Her hard work paid off, and she recently stood alongside some of Chaufty’s American relatives while a plaque honoring his memory was unveiled in the village. 

Read the full story here.

President Joe Biden left the campaign trail this week and flew to France for the 80th anniversary of D-Day, where he’ll give speeches touting American alliances that beat back dictatorships bent on world conquest.

Biden is in a long string of presidents who have delivered that sort of message over the years as they built and sustained a Western bloc rooted in free markets, democratic governance and individual freedoms.

As yet unknown is whether he’ll be the last.

Read the full story here.

An American flag is unfurled, as a band of pipers play during an early morning ceremony to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day on Utah Beach, in Normandy, northwestern France today.