Hundreds Attend Funeral Of Veteran Who Had No Family

When word got out on the passing of an Air Force Veteran with no family, local veterans took notice and took action.

Together they provided former Tinker Airman Mark Wayne Howell with a funeral service with full military honors.

“You see a lot of great patriots here, great Americans to send this guy off,” says Scotty Deatherage of Honoring America’s Warriors of the hundreds of people in attendance.

“This is a veteran whose body went unclaimed,” adds Deatherage.

Several military veteran groups put Howell's story out on social media and hundreds answered the call for Thursday’s service in  Oklahoma City and Fort Sill National Cemetery.

“Nobody probably knew this guy personally, never met him before,” says Deatherage.

Mark Wayne Howell enlisted in US Air Force in 1983 in Boise,  Idaho and was assigned to the AWACS unit. 

We was stationed at Tinker Air Force base before being honorably discharged in 1985.

After a service at OK Cremation and Funeral Home, Patriot Guard Rider escorted Howell’s casket to Fort Sill, where he was buried.

“It’s always sad to lose a fellow veteran, especially no with no family. So we are family that's why we come,” says Veteran Douglas Mills about the man he did not know.