Two Western Pennsylvania women were among the victims in Thursday's shooting rampage in Fort Hood, including a 55-year-old lieutenant colonel who was one of 13 people who died in the attack.

Juanita Warman, a nurse practioner, was among those killed, according to her family.

Ms. Warman was born in South Side Hospital and attended Langley High.

Among those wounded at Fort Hood was Army 2nd Lt. Brandy Mason, of Monessen, according to her aunt, Sabrina Heath.

Ms. Heath said her niece was wounded in the thigh and underwent surgery yesterday morning. She is expected to recover.

"She was standing there waiting her turn at the military medical place, and she said a gentleman walked in and she looked around to see who came in, and the next thing she knows there were shots fired," Ms. Heath said in an interview with KDKA-TV. "She said people just started getting out of the way, scattering."

Lt. Mason, a 1996 graduate of Monessen High School, has been in the military for four years. She has a 17-year-old daughter who now attends the school and was on the homecoming court two weeks ago. Lt. Mason had returned to Monessen to attend.

Asked to describe how her niece is doing, Ms. Heath said, "I think she was a little upset. She was overseas and never got shot at or anything, and she's right here in the United States and got shot."

Another Western Pennsylvania native, Margaret Brewster, formerly of Homestead, was at Fort Hood on Thursday but was not injured in the shooting. Ms. Brewster has worked since 2001 as a civilian public information officer for the base.

Ms. Brewster spent part of her day Thursday checking on arrangements for college diplomas to be awarded to soldiers inside an auditorium. The annual event allows service members who were deployed to receive their diplomas.

Satisfied that everything was ready, Ms. Brewster left the auditorium in the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, where medical and dental care is provided to those about to deploy overseas. She went back to her office in headquarters.

And then she got a call: shots fired in the readiness center.

Personally, Ms. Brewster worried about her staff and her daughter, who works at one of the schools on the base that's home to 50,000 soldiers and twice that many military family members.

"I knew the people I left there were right in that vicinity [of the shootings]," she recalled. "And I wondered, 'Is my daughter safe?' Fortunately, everyone was safe," she said, choking up.

As word spread throughout the country, relatives still living in this area began calling to see if Ms. Brewster was safe.

Others from throughout the country with family members or friends at Fort Hood did the same. Personnel at Fort Hood had difficulty making cell phone calls, so crowded were cell networks.

"I was answering phone calls from family members from all over the country worried about loved ones here. I was trying to give as much information as I could [to relieve their apprehensions]," she recalled.

When she had time to process her feelings, Ms. Brewster was overcome.

"It's overwhelming," she said, breaking down."We've sent the most troops overseas and have had the largest number of casualties. We just see a tremendous sacrifice from the peple here and you live with that everyday. But this is is just beyond that. It is a shock."

Washington correspondent Daniel Malloy writes the "Pittsburgh On The Potomac" blog exclusively at PG+, a members-only web site of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.