Kareena’s miracle came in the form of strangers who helped save her life. Today, she’s 25 years old and reunited with the doctor who performed her surgery.
HOUSTON — Twenty-five years ago, the Sept. 11 attacks brought air travel across the United States to a standstill. At that time in Houston, six-month-old Kareena was running out of time.
Kareena’s liver was failing. The transplant she desperately needed was hundreds of miles away in Nashville. Getting it to Houston would require an extraordinary act of courage.
Today, Kareena is 25 years old and studying law, not surprisingly, with a focus on health policy. But 25 years ago, she was too sick to leave the hospital. Her life depended on a liver that had to somehow make its way from Nashville to Houston.
“There’s only a few livers every year that would match her size and blood type,” said Dr. John Goss with Texas Children’s Hospital.
The transplant offer came on Sept. 10, 2001. Then came Sept. 11.
As terrorists attacked and flights across the country were grounded, Kareena’s lifesaving transplant was suddenly in jeopardy.
“It became apparent that we may not be able to get the liver here,” Goss said.
Driving from Nashville would take too long. The liver would not survive. Then nine brave volunteers loaded onto a Tennessee Air National Guard C-130 Hercules, an aircraft built to carry soldiers and heavy military equipment. It was cleared to fly.
Its cargo was just 10 ounces — a donor liver carried through a sky empty of planes.
“The pilots that flew this liver here were in the same flight crew of a couple of the American jets that ended up crashing and were taken over,” Goss said. “So he was not going to let another bad event happen.”
The liver arrived at Texas Children’s Hospital. The transplant worked, and Kareena’s life became a gift from a donor family and so many people who refused to let the day end in another life lost.
“Being told that you’re the subject of this story is both a privilege, but it also comes with a sense of obligation and I want to make the most of the life that so many strangers worked to give me,” Kareena said.
Kareena may have been too young to know what was happening on 9/11 25 years ago, but she says the family born from strangers’ actions taught her a valuable lesson.
“And so you’re saving a life with a transplant,” she said. “It does more than just save one life. It creates so many more.”
And a reminder for us all, 25 years after our country was shaken — the worst of humanity does not erase the best of it.
“It shows that the good will always win in the end,” Goss said.
On a day remembered for the lives stolen by terror, Kareena’s story is also about a life that was saved.
Got a news tip or story idea? Email us at newstips@khou.com or call 713-521-4310 and include your name and the best way to reach you.