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Evacuation Flights
Flight nurses revolutionize military medical care
publication U.S. Department of Defense Information / FIND
published March 14, 2013
U.S. Air Force Releases
3/14/2013 FORT MEADE, Md. (AFNS) Before World War II, the U.S. military showed little desire for using aircraft and flight nurses to evacuate wounded soldiers to rear areas. The global war, however, forced the U.S. Army Air Forces to revolutionize military medical care in the advancement of air evacuation (later referred to as aeromedical evacuation) and flight nurses.
The rapid continuing development of USAAF air transportation routes worldwide made it viable to fly wounded and sick servicemen quickly to completely equipped hospitals far away from the front lines. This revolution saved the lives of countless wounded men, plus the introduction of flight nurses helped to make it possible.
Noisy . 1942, airlift units in Alaska, Burma and New Guinea successfully evacuated patients utilizing the same transport aircraft which have carried men and supplies for the front. Caused by a pressing need, the USAAF created medical air evacuation squadrons and commenced a rush training curriculum for flight surgeons, enlisted medical technicians, and flight nurses at Bowman Field, near Louisville, Ky.
The necessity of flight nurses became critical right after the Allied invasion of North Africa in November 1942, although the women at Bowman Field we had not finished their training. Nevertheless, the USAAF sent these nurses to North Africa on Christmas Day.
On Feb. 18, 1943, the U.S. Army Nurse Corps’ high quality of flight nurses formally graduated at Bowman Field. 2nd Lt. Geraldine Dishroon, the honour graduate, received the primary wings presented to a flight nurse. In 1944, Dishroon served on the first air evacuation team to land on Omaha Beach following the D Day invasion.
For the reason that aircraft used in air evacuation also transported military supplies, they could not display the Red Cross. With no markings to suggest their non combat status, these evacuation flights were at risk of enemy attacks. For this reason, flight nurses and medical technicians were volunteers.
To prepare for any emergency, flight nurses learned crash procedures, received survival training, and studied the effects of thin air on various kinds of patients. Also, flight nurses had to be in top health to care for patients throughout these rigorous flights.
A few those flight nurses, 1st Lt. Aleda Lutz, and 1st Lt. Mary Hawkins, could be awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, your second highest honor a military member can receive near the Medal of Honor.
Just about the most celebrated flight nurses of World War II, 1st Lt. Aleda E. Lutz flew 196 missions and evacuated over 3,500 men. In November 1944, during an medical flight from entry lines near Lyons, Italy, her crashed killing all aboard. Awarded the Air Medal with four Oak Leaf Clusters, she posthumously received the Distinguished Flying Cross.
On Sept. 24, 1944, 1st Lt. Mary Louise Hawkins was evacuating 24 patients through the fighting at Palau to Guadalcanal once the C 47 ran close to fuel. The pilot created a forced landing in a very clearing on Bellona Island. In the landing, a propeller tore through the fuselage and severed the trachea of a single patient.
Hawkins produced suction tube from various items such as inflation tube from a “Mae West.” Because of this contrivance, she kept the man’s throat totally free of blood until aid arrived 19 hours later. All her patients survived. To be with her actions, Hawkins received the Distinguished Flying Cross.
On March 22, 1945, two CG 4A gliders landed inside of a clearing at the bridgehead at Remagen, Germany, to evacuate 25 severely injured American and German casualties. After the gliders were loaded, C 47 transports successfully snatched them from their landing site and towed those to a military hospital in France.
Inside the second glider, 1st Lt. Suella V. Bernard, who had volunteered for your mission, covered the wounded on the way. Among the initial two nurses to fly into Normandy once the D Day invasion, Bernard was crowned only nurse seen to have took part in a glider combat mission during World War II. Due to this mission, she received the oxygen Medal.
For the reason that flight nurse on the first intercontinental air evacuation flight, 2nd Lt. Elsie S. Ott demonstrated the chance of air evacuation in January 1943. An Army nurse who had not flown within the airplane and had no air evacuation training, she successfully oversaw the movement of five seriously ill patients from India to Washington, D.C.
This six trip might have normally taken three months by ship and ground transportation. To be with her actions about this historic flight, Ott received the very first Air Medal provided a female, and she also received formal flight nurse training.
Eventually, about 500 Army nurses served as people 31 medical air evacuation transport squadrons operating worldwide. It's really a tribute on their skill that regarding the 1,176,048 patients air evacuated during the entire war, only 46 died en route. Seventeen flight nurses lost their lives in the war.


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