The veterans started showing up well before 6:30 a.m. Monday at Meadows Field Airport in Bakersfield.

About 80 military veterans who served during the Vietnam War were there, each one dressed in a blue shirt. The guardians who watch over them wore red, and the staff volunteers who organize the flights were dressed in white.

Another veteran flight organized by Honor Flight Kern County — the 54th — was about to take off.

No one who had a seat on that plane could have known that it would never get off the ground. Who could have guessed that the wrong connector to a tow bar could stop a flight for which planning had begun nearly a year before?

“We’ve never had this issue,” said Lili Marsh, founder of Honor Flight Kern County.

“They were slightly delayed to begin with, and then, for whatever reason, they get ready to connect the tow bar to pull the plane away from the gate, and it doesn’t fit.”

“Allegiant Air is saying that there’s a connector and the connector was wrong. I’m no mechanic,” Marsh said, “but apparently the tow bar was right, but the connector was wrong — or something to that effect.

“The tow bar did not fit correctly.”

A call went up to Fresno to have the correct connector driven down to Bakersfield.

Meanwhile, the three-day itinerary for an Honor Flight tour is like a jigsaw puzzle. Everything fits together precisely, but it’s all on a timetable, and the timetable was slipping away.

“At 1 o’clock, they still could not tell us when that piece of equipment would be on the road, so they said, ‘Well, maybe we can leave by 5 p.m.,’ but if we left at 5, their pilots were going to time out, so they were going to fly more pilots in to Burbank (who) were going to rent a car and drive to Bakersfield.

“These guys, older crowd, have been sitting since 7 o’clock in the morning. If we left at 5, we’d have gotten there at 10:30, driven an hour to the hotel, and then you add the three hours of the time change, and then they have to be up at 5:30 in the morning, which just didn’t make sense, and I didn’t think it was healthy for a good number of these veterans.

Marsh said she was unable to reach Kern County Airports Director Bill LaManque. The Californian also had no luck in reaching the director.

However, at about 6 p.m., the following statement from Meadows Field Airport arrived:

“Kern County and Meadows Field Airport honor our veterans and have long been proud to support them as they embark on their meaningful Honor Flight journey,” the statement said. “We are disappointed that today’s Honor Flight was canceled due to unforeseen aircraft issues.

“We know how much this experience means to the veterans who have served our country,” the statement continued. “We look forward to welcoming them back to Meadows Field for the next scheduled Honor Flight and giving them the sendoff and warm welcome home they deserve.”

As it turned out, the vets apparently made the best of a less-than-ideal situation.

“All in all,” Marsh said, “the veterans were in far better humor than our team was. We were all crying and sad … We were very unhappy. I mean, unhappy for them for the vets because they couldn’t go.

“I think they were handling it better than we were,” she said.

Dennis Durbin, 78, a Vietnam combat veteran who served as a Huey helicopter pilot in 1970 and 1971 was supposed to be on Honor Flight No. 54.

The recipient of a National Defense Medal, a Vietnam Service Medal, an Army Aviators Badge, a Bronze Star, 42 Air Medals and more, gave much credit to the Honor Flight team.

“They did a great job,” he said. “They had everything rolling smoothly. We were on the plane for about an hour and a half or so before they still could get a tool bar there to get us out of the parking area.”

Once the vets were off the plane, pizza was brought in for them, “which was very nice,” the former chopper pilot said.

“And we waited patiently and we all, of course, were sure that we were going to get to go.

“But, along about 2 o’clock … there was just no way they could guarantee our getting there at any reasonable time.

“The idea that we couldn’t get out of the parking gate because they didn’t have the right tow bar for the aircraft …” Durbin let whatever was coming remain unsaid.

“Anyway, not my agenda,” he said.

“Everyone there was well-mannered, all the veterans.

“I think they were disappointed, but at the same time, there was a lot of camaraderie going on, even while we were waiting to get on the plane, and then when we got off, people talking and sharing stories and meeting new people. And that was, I think, a good part of the purpose of the flight. So, we did get to enjoy it.”

“They did tell us that they’ve got the next flight scheduled for April next year. And all of us will be first in line,” he said. “I think most of the soldiers will certainly make the effort to try to do that.

“I also want to thank the people of Kern County for supporting the Honor Flights, because they’re the ones that will be raising funds to pay for all this,” Durbin said.

“And of course, the guardians who are paying $1,500 apiece to go with us and help us. They also deserve kudos for all they are doing.

“It really is impressive because we know much they’ve given to get us there.”