Minnesota National Guard Member is Nation’s First Air Guard Flight Nurse to Receive Distinguished Flying Cross Medal

(KNSI) — A Minnesota National Guard Air Force Major has earned the Distinguished Flying Cross Medal for her heroic actions during a medevac operation in the summer of 2021.

Major Katie Lunning is the country’s first Air National Guard flight nurse to receive the nation’s highest award for aerial achievement while participating in the largest aeromedical evacuation airlift in Kabul Coalition Hospital’s history.

According to a press release from the Minnesota National Guard, Maj. Lunning was among the first members of an aeromedical evacuation team to mobilize for a no-notice urgent combat mission. Within hours, she responded to a mass casualty event caused by a suicide bomber at Hamid Karzai International Airport that killed 13 U.S. service members.

Lunning performed triage and intake to 22 patients while under small arms fire and threat of imminent attack at HKIA on the night of August 26th, 2021. She then sustained in-flight medical care for a more than eight hour medevac flight to Landstuhl, Germany.

The patients were multinational and joint service casualties and Afghan evacuees; they varied in age and injury, but all were in critical condition. From obtaining intravenous access to a two-year-old patient without pediatric medical resources to managing a lifesaving in-flight massive blood resuscitation of a post-operative patient, Lunning’s professional competence and aerial skill ensured all 22 patients survived.

As she ran off the C-130 to load patients for transport, Lunning recalls thinking, “I couldn’t control the scary stuff, but I could nurse the patients that needed me. That is what I focused on.”

“From an Intensive Care Unit Nurse Manager in Iowa to a Critical Care Air Transport Team Nurse on a flight line in Bagram, Lunning emulates the power of the Citizen Airman,” said Army Maj. Gen. Shawn Manke, the Minnesota National Guard’s Adjutant General. “The training and experience from her civilian nursing career served the nation and its partners.”

Air Force Gen. Michael Loh, Director of the Air National Guard, is traveling to Minnesota to present the award to Lunning for her heroic efforts.

Maj. Lunning grew up in Hastings and is a member of the St. Paul-based 133rd Airlift Wing.

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