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Schedule

Sunday, September 29th
9:00am – 11:00am

Location

Hilton Virginia Beach Oceanfront
3001 Atlantic Avenue
Virginia Beach, VA 23451

Peacock Ballroom
Second Floor

Tickets

$35 – Adult
$25 – Children under 16

Tickets include a continental breakfast, access to the event, Q&A Session and Autograph Opportunities

Sponsors

03 Neptune Festival Parade SRP 127

Let’s celebrate our hometown heroes.

The Neptune Festival invites you to celebrate excellence at Neptune’s Final Toast in honor of our Hometown Heroes. Local heroes will be honored during Boardwalk Weekend at a Sunday breakfast by the sea.


Neptune Festival Parade 

Many of those who have chosen to live in our community have also chosen to make their professions in ways that provide valuable and critically needed services to all of us. They do this every day – quietly, efficiently and effectively. The Neptune Festival has established a program to recognize these organizations each year through representatives chosen by their organization’s leaders.

They are the defenders of our community and our country, our soldiers and police officers, sailors and firefighters, marines, airmen, emergency medical service volunteers and coast guardsmen, and they are those who teach our children. What they do for us all is epic in the truest sense – they are our hometown heroes.

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Bresnik Photo

2024 Keynote Speaker

Randolph “Komrade” Bresnik

NASA Astronaut, and U.S. Marine Corps Colonel, Ret.

Randy “Komrade” Bresnik was selected as an astronaut in 2004. He was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps in May 1989. During his military career, he became an F/A-18 Test Pilot and was eventually deployed to Kuwait to fly combat missions in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. A veteran of STS-129, he has also trained as a Cave-a-naut with the European Space Agency to test living deep beneath the Earth’s surface as well as an Aquanaut for NASA’s Extreme Environment Mission Operation (NEEMO) 19.

From 2012 through 2015, Bresnik served as the Lead Astronaut for NASA’s partnership with the SpaceX Company in the design and development of their crewed Dragon Capsule as well as a Capsule Communicator (CAPCOM) in the Mission Control Center.

Bresnik most recently served as the Commander of the International Space Station for Expedition 53 and flight engineer for Expedition 52. Currently, he serves as the Assistant-to-the-Chief of the Astronaut Office for Exploration managing the development and testing of everything that will operate beyond low earth orbit on Artemis missions.

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2024 Hometown Heroes

We’re taking this opportunity to celebrate some of our own hometown heroes. Thank you for all that you do!

Paula Hernandez,
W.T. Cooke Elementary School

Virginia Beach City Public Schools

Michael McCracken

Virginia Beach Dept Of Emergency Medical Services

Captain Scott Springer

Virginia Beach Fire Department

Sergeant Christopher Washington

Virginia Beach Police Department

Sergeant Gerald Wells

Virginia Beach Sheriff's Office

AM1 Aaron J. Pacheco, USN

United States Navy

Gunnery Sergeant Eric N. Gonzales, USMC

United States Marine Corps

BMC William T. Campbell, USCG

United States Coast Guard

Sergeant Gregory Hardy, USA

United States Army