Some 50 other wounded US troops and their families and friends will travel with her on a C-17 US military aircraft, a spokesman for the US airbase at Ramstein said.

The plane was expected at Andrews airbase, near Washington later in the day.

The 19-year-old's dramatic rescue on April 1 turned her into a national hero in the US press, but there were conflicting reports of her injuries.

Colonel David Rubenstein, the military commander at the Landstuhl medical center, has said they included fractures to her right arm, both legs, her right foot and her right ankle, as well as head and spinal injuries, but not gunshot or knife wounds.

Initial press reports had quoted a US official as saying she had sustained multiple gunshot wounds and watched other soldiers in her unit die around her in fighting when she was captured.

Iraqi forces ambushed Lynch's company after it took a wrong turn near the southern city of Nasiriyah on March 23.

US special forces who rescued her found the bodies of eight of her comrades who had initially been listed as missing in action.

SPACE.WIRE