Marine Corporal Danny Chen lost his life while serving in Afghanistan, leaving behind a final wish to rest in his small hometown of Millfield, Montana. He wanted to be buried next to his father, Michael, who had passed away in a motorcycle accident years earlier. When severe winter storms grounded military transport out of Fort Carson in Colorado, officials informed his grieving mother, Sarah, that her son would be delayed for weeks. Desperate to have her child home for Christmas, Sarah shared her heartbreak online with a support group. Within six hours, the Rolling Thunder motorcycle club organized an impossible rescue mission.
When the club arrived at the military base, the commander warned chapter president Big Jake about the extreme danger of traveling through whiteout conditions and closed mountain passes. Jake and his group of forty seven veterans, ranging in age from twenty three to seventy four, politely refused to leave without the fallen hero. They successfully claimed the flag draped casket and secured it inside a custom motorcycle hearse. The riders then began their brutal journey through eighteen degree weather, rotating positions every fifty miles to prevent freezing in the harsh wind.
Law enforcement initially attempted to stop the procession in Wyoming due to closed roads, but officers quickly decided to provide a police escort instead. The dedicated group rode for eighteen hours on their first day, receiving free meals from moved citizens at a truck stop outside Casper. A severe storm on the second day caused three riders to slip on black ice, but they all remounted their motorcycles and continued moving forward. When their specialized hearse hit another patch of ice two hundred miles from their destination, a local rancher organized twelve pickup trucks to surround and protect the bikers.
The protective convoy finally reached Millfield at dawn on the third day, where the entire town had gathered in the snow to welcome them. Sarah greeted the exhausted riders with profound gratitude before laying her son to rest on Christmas Eve alongside his father. During the emotional funeral service, Big Jake placed Michael’s old leather vest onto the casket as the forty seven bikers started their engines in a unified final salute. This remarkable display of dedication inspired Sarah to learn how to ride a motorcycle herself and start a memorial fund to help other military families.