That'* one thing I could never do is pass the flag.

Passing the flag is one of the best things from what I've heard. I never passed the flag, but as NFP I would give the Next of Kin three of the rounds that we fired. I'm pretty sure that'* close enough. The amount of thanks and praise that we got from the families was outstanding.

We would take the 3 rounds and place them inside of the folded flag. One time, we had one catch on the tip of a glove and it came back out of the flag, fell off the glove, land on the metal casket, roll off, down into the concrete vault making all sorts of noise. I heard one of the family members utter "ah ****".

We don't tuck the rounds in. Something about being against the flag code. Don't know if it'* true or not, never looked it up. I just said "ok boss", since he was an E6.

General rule is, you can add to, but cannot taketh away.

Spent the last 10 minutes researching. Including government sites...


This is the mininum a team must provide. No mention.
http://www.militaryfuneralhonors.osd...ion%201491.doc

US Code: Title 4, Chapter 1, says nothing about placing brass inside a folded flag.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/ht...01_4_10_1.html

Our second funeral, was an active duty soldier that died inroute to school at Fort Carson, CO. His father was a Major in the Army. At the ceremony, we had aprx 15 active duty officers and a number of NCO'*. Everysingle one of them thanked us for the outstanding service we had provided and they were glad to see the casings go inside the flag.

I don't ever recall a funeral director saying anything about it either.

I did see some posts on forums about the casings placed inside, but no mention of it being illegal or anything. Actually, I have found many posts wondering why they were not found inside.

Actually the US Flag Code is fairly specific on what you can and cannot do with the flag.

See Title 4, Sec 8.h - The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.

Back at the National Fire Academy (NFA) they had to get special approval from the President to carry folded flags with a long stem Red Rose touching it, and to deliver the flag to the family with the Rose on top.

This is pretty vague...

I'm thinking using the flag to carry a newborn baby.
Using it to carry a dead deer out of the woods.
Or using it to wrap bricks of coke with it.

They had to get special permission to put a rose on it?

Yet they didn't get special permission to fly Airforce 1 over NYC? Technically, it wasn't Airforce 1. It'* only Airforce 1 when the president is on it. Anyother time its something else.

Vague is what it is. The way we role in the AF is this: If it doesn't say you can, then you can't. So based on what that says, we CAN'T put brass in the flag.

I was under the impression the VA governed how funerals were conducted, not the AF.

Did you know, it is actually written in the UCMJ that the missionary position is the ONLY authorized position. And it is punishable.

No, Congress just mandated that everybody who has served honorably is entitled to a Military Funeral. Each services Honor Guard does things differently though. The main gist is the same, but we do certain things differently.

Also, on the UCMJ thing...it says sodomy is illegal, not anything but missionary LOL. That'* a big misunderstanding.