America's National Memorial Day Concert Cancelled

The outdoor event on the National Mall was hosted by actor Gary Sinise, who told the audience a severe weather warning had been issued and urged them to leave the concert and seek shelter.

Country singer Trace Adkins and rock band Daughtry had already performed before the show was cut short.

The event was broadcast in the U.S. on the Pbs network and TV bosses were forced to fill the slot with footage from the dress rehearsal instead.

A series of posts on the Pbs Twitter.com page read, "The National Memorial Day Concert has been cancelled due to severe weather conditions in the Washington, DC area... The first 45 minutes of tonight's Natl (sic) Memorial Day Concert were broadcast before weather forced (the) rest of the show to be cancelled... We edited in video from yesterday's dress rehearsal to fill in (the) 2nd half."

Daughtry star Chris Daughtry adds, "What a day!!! So honoured that we got to perform for the troops!! Bummed that the rest of the show was cancelled due to weather."