Karen J. Wagner

Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army - medical personnel officer in the Office of the Army Surgeon General and the Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel, a promotion she had received the month before.

She grew up in a military family in San Antonio, played guard for the women's basketball team at Nevada-Las Vegas and came out of its ROTC programme in 1984, and took a master's in health services administration in 1992.

She was adjutant of the 85th Medical Evacuation Hospital at Fort Lee, executive officer and company commander of D Company in the 187th Medical Battalion at Fort Sam Houston, and chief of personnel for the 57th Evacuation Hospital at Würzburg, and ran the personnel services branch at Walter Reed.

Seventeen years in, she was sketching out a second act. She watched the Food Network and ran to clear her head, and she and her sister talked about retiring at the same time - teaching in Texas first and then abroad, or a cooking programme together. Her sister said: her shtick was baking, mine was cooking.

Her sister also said: she never met a stranger. She was the kind of person who, when you met her, would never forget you - she'd talk to you like she'd known you forever.

Killed at the Pentagon on the morning of 11 September 2001, when American Airlines flight 77 struck the western face of the building at 9:37. A hundred and twenty-five people inside and fifty-nine aboard the aircraft were killed.

Her sister Kim.