Here are the top stories for the week of Dec. 14, 2020, straight from AWN News 6 Correspondent, Jolene McNutt:

Free Christmas Trees for Troops

For 15 years the Christmas Spirit Foundation has been donating trees to military families and troops serving overseas. This year, they estimate that 14,500 trees will be making their way to a total of 79 military bases around the world. The trees are donated by farms, nurseries, retail lots, and individual supporters across America to fulfill the mission to “deliver the spirit of Christmas to military families—one tree at a time.” Trees are given free of charge to qualifying military families. Your local MWR program determines eligibility for each location.

Military Members in Hallmark Holiday Movie

Military Families Magazine shared that a Hallmark holiday movie featured real military members as extras. USS Christmas “tells the story of a Norfolk, Virginia, news reporter named Maddie, who goes on a Tiger Cruise during the holiday season . . . she comes across a mystery in the ship’s archive room . . . and meets a handsome sailor along the way.” The movie was filmed in Wilmington, North Carolina, and local military members from Camp Lejeune were cast as extras in the film. The military personnel were paid for their time and filmed on their own time. They were part of a scene where sailors attended a Christmas Ball. USS Christmas premiered on Nov. 28.

Operation Christmas Drop: The Real Story

Netflix also debuted a new movie, Operation Christmas Drop. Although the movie is fictional and follows the traditional holiday movie plot involving a surprise romance and some debacles along the way, the theme of the movie was based on a real operation with the same name. According to Military.com, “since 1952, U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules cargo planes have been dropping Christmas cheer and critical supplies throughout 55 islands across 1.8 million miles of the Pacific Ocean.”

Military.com shared that “boxes dropped on the islands contain items ranging from rice and other foodstuffs, canned goods, fishing nets, clothing, school supplies, or anything else island life might require.” Additionally, the operation is sometimes used as a joint training exercise between the United States, Japan, and Australia. About 90 percent of the movie was filmed on Andersen Air Force Base, located on Guam, according to Stars and Stripes. “There is no way to build an Air Force base for a movie—you just have to move onto one,” director Martin Wood told Stars and Stripes.
You can learn more about the real Operation Christmas Drop at Andersen Air Force Base and more about the movie at Military.com and Stripes.com. The movie is available on Netflix.

Operation Christmas Drop Photo by: Senior Airman Matthew Gilmore |  VIRIN: 191213-F-GA541-0645.JPG