In 1945 she became the first Navy flight nurse in an active combat zone,[1] serving at Iwo Jima in the Pacific.

[4] After graduating, Kendeigh joined the first class of US Navy's School of Air Evacuation.

[5][6] Kendeigh joined the evacuation mission to an active combat zone in the Pacific.

On March 6, 1945, at 22 years old, Kendeigh was the first flight nurse to land at Iwo Jima.

[8] Flight nurses tended and evacuated 1,176,048 military patients during the war; only 46 died on the journey.