VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Family and friends are remembering Kate Nixon, who worked on the second floor in Building 2.
She worked as the Compliance Manager of the Public Utility Facility for the City of Virginia Beach. Her degree was in civil engineering, “she was widely respected in her field and was a strong advocate for women pursing careers in engineering,” according to her obituary in the Virginian-Pilot on Wednesday morning.
The 42-year-old was an employee for Virginia Beach for 10 years, was president of the Pembroke Meadows Civic League, and she loved her church, St. Gregory The Great Catholic Church.
Inside the sanctuary you can find a memorial remembering the Virginia Beach 12, and in the middle of the 12 is Nixon.
“I just think she is a woman involved in her life and happy to be married. She is happy to have children, and she was always helping people,” said the church’s priest, Father Eric Vogt.
Kate supported the Little Sisters of the Poor, which provides homes for the neediest of the elderly.
“She was always at 9 a.m. mass with her three kids, and with Jason, who is her husband, and she felt part of her family here.”
Imagine the horror of a family friend who was online with Kate shortly before she died.
“At 4 p.m. Kate clicks on the Novena to the Holy Spirit, and it dings on my Pad at 4:06 p.m.,” said Deacon Darrell Wentworth. “Kate calls Jason and says ‘I’ve been shot, would you call 911.’ Jason is freaking out … and he gets this phone call and then he’s freaking out, he calls 911, he then tries to call her back and can’t.”
Jason can’t get through to his beloved because we know from the video what was happening. Wentworth would eventually meet Jason at Sentara Norfolk General, but that turned out to not be true.
They then went to the family holding area at Princess Anne Middle School waiting for the bad news to come, and it came. “From Jason’s perspective that is the last thing he heard his wife say, that will be with him for the rest of his life.”
Wentworth, who builds home additions, could very well have been in Building 2 himself at 4 p.m. on Friday had he not been lazy and telling himself, I’ll wait until Monday.
“Do I think about that? Yes. Does it hit close to home? Yes. Definitely. I would have walked in where the guy was shot, so yeah I do think about it a lot, yeah. This is the mysteries of God.”
Wentworth also notes how devoted Kate was to following Jesus even after she had given birth. Wentworth led the Tuesday night Bible study.
“Within about a week. She took a week off, but MacKenize in the front row was nursing while we are going through the class. That is dedication. She didn’t take three months off.”
There’s lots of questions, and the homily Sunday was “why does God let this disaster happen?”
Vogt told us, “The answer is God didn’t let this happen. It was done by someone who went berserk … God didn’t let it happen. The devil did it, and the devil is working in this world.”
There will be a funeral mass for Kate Nixon at St. Gregory tomorrow morning 11 a.m.