The oldest of three musically and academically talented sisters from Auburn died on Monday, Feb. 12, after collapsing in an airport outside London, England.

Cassandra Karpinski, 20, was returning from a trip to Amsterdam with several fellow students from Ithaca College in New York when she collapsed and died after running through an airport in the town of Luton, in south England, said John Karpinski, her father.

“She was extraordinary,” he said. “This is a terrible blow.”

Karpinski’s mother died just two months ago, he said, and Karpinski will be buried next to her at the Auburn Village Cemetery once her body is returned.

Services will likely be held at Auburn’s St. Peter Church.

John Karpinski said his daughter’s heart condition was minor, but required that she keep hydrated. He said she and fellow students were running late throughout their return trip to London, and said high stress levels may have exacerbated the problem.

Karpinski graduated from Auburn Village school with honors and from Pinkerton Academy with honors in 2004. She’s the oldest of three Auburn sisters to go through the schools.

“They are all just wonderful girls,” said Pinkerton Academy Headmaster Mary Anderson. “This is just overwhelming for me. It’s not normal for a girl this age to die so suddenly.”

Anderson remembered sitting with her own mother and being “blown away” watching Karpinski play piano inside the school.

“She was such a beautiful girl,” Anderson said. “We are stunned by this.”

In a short time, Karpinski racked up an impressive list of achievements. Her father said she was a regular on the dean’s list, president of the Pinkerton Academy band, a member of the National Honor Society and an All-state pianist and clarinetist.

Karpinski was in her third year at Ithaca College on a $30,000 scholarship, and had been studying abroad from the college’s London center.

She had a lifelong interest in writing, her father said, and had recently been contributing stories to London-based Peace News, a magazine dedicated to curbing military action.

“She was an achiever,” said Karpinski’s father. “She never wasted an hour of her life.”