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Wall of Honor Level:
Air and Space Friend

Honored by:
Ms. Pamela Durham-Belland

Captain Kris M. Belland entered active duty as a midshipman at the United States Naval Academy, graduating in 1984. He is a dually-designated Naval Aviator and Naval Flight Surgeon as well as a surface warfare medical department officer. Captain Belland is board certified in Family Practice and in Aerospace Medicine. He is a Fellow of the Aerospace Medicine Association and current President of the International Association of Military Flight Surgeons and Pilots.
Captain Belland served aboard the aircraft carriers USS Midway (C-41), USS Independence (CV-62), and USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70) during Operation Southern Watch as the flight surgeon for Carrier Air Wings Five and Fourteen respectively and aboard USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63) as the Senior Medical Officer and Battle Forces Seventh Fleet Surgeon deploying in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He has accrued over 1,200 hours of flight time in various aircraft including the F/A-18, F-14, EA-6B, and S-3 with over 112 arrested landings aboard aircraft carriers and 25 combat missions over Iraq.
As the senior dual-designated flight surgeon at Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center (NSAWC) and Navy Fighter Weapons School (TOPGUN) in Fallon, Nevada, he was a co-investigator for USN/USAF photorefractive keratectomy studies. Captain Belland was the first US Navy physician to attend the USAF Air War College, where he was awarded the USAF Historical Foundation’s Research and Writing Award for the best aerospace report of major significance to the United States Air Force during the year 2001 for his paper entitled “Aircrew Performance Cutting-Edge Tech.” He has also served as THIRD Fleet Surgeon.
The Society of US Naval Flight Surgeons has bestowed upon him both the Richard Leuhrs Flight Surgeon of the Year Award for US Navy and Marine Corps in 1994 and the Sonny Carter Memorial Award in 2000.