![\"In](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/thumb\/msid-134192686,imgsize-74630,width-400,height-225,resizemode-4\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg\" "\\"Dr")
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nOn September 11, 2001, while the US was dealing with the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, a six-month-old baby in Houston was fighting for her life. Kareena needed a liver transplant, but the donor organ was nearly 800 miles away in Nashville, and the civilian flights across the US had been grounded.The liver, packed in ice inside a box roughly two feet by one foot, eventually reached Houston aboard a C-130 cargo plane, Houston Chronicle reported. The aircraft, operated by the Tennessee Air National Guard, carried the organ from Nashville to Ellington Field. From there, soldiers took it to Texas Children\u2019s Hospital, where doctors were waiting to perform the transplant.Kareena had been born with biliary atresia, a congenital defect in which the ducts that drain bile from the liver do not form. Because the bile could not drain properly, her liver became badly damaged at a very young age. By September 2001, she had spent most of her short life in the Texas Medical Center and was too sick to go home.\u201cShe was too ill to leave the hospital,\u201d Dr John Goss, the hospital\u2019s medical director for transplant services, told Houstone Chronicle, 25 years after the transplant. \u201cShe was very sick, and she wasn\u2019t going to survive very long without a transplant,\u201d he added.The chance of a transplant came on the night of September 10, when Goss received a call from his former colleague at Vanderbilt University, Dr Ravi Chari. A liver that could match the six-month-old\u2019s size and blood type was available in Nashville.<\/p>\n The original plan was Chari would remove the liver in Nashville, Tennessee Donor Services would arrange a charter flight to Houston, and Goss would transplant the organ into Kareena.That plan changed the next morning. Goss was treating adult patients at St Luke\u2019s when the first plane hit the World Trade Center in New York. He later recalled, \u201cIt\u2019s weird. I can still remember we were in a patient room when the first jet flew into the tower.\u201dA second plane hit the World Trade Center soon after. As the attacks unfolded in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania, the Federal Aviation Administration grounded every civilian aircraft in the country.In Nashville, Chari was still in the operating room with the donor liver. The charter flight that was supposed to carry the organ was no longer possible.Jill Grandas, who was then a coordinator with Tennessee Donor Services and is now its CEO, was told that the flight had been cancelled. A road journey to Houston was considered but rejected. At the time, the organ could not survive the roughly 12-hour drive.Grandas then went to the mail room, took out a phone book and called the air-traffic control tower at Nashville International Airport. She explained that a baby in Houston would die without the liver waiting in the operating room.The supervisor who answered understood the situation. Grandas later learnt that the woman had a relative on a transplant waiting list.Within minutes, another option emerged. The Tennessee Air National Guard agreed to fly the liver to Houston. \u201cIt was a feeling of joy in the midst of something so tragic,\u201d Grandas said. \u201cWe were determined that we weren\u2019t going to let another person die as a result of that attack.\u201d<\/p>\n Kareena takes selfie with the doctor who saved her life 25 years ago<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n Nine National Guard members boarded a C-130 Hercules aircraft and flew the liver to Houston. The aircraft can carry up to 47,000 pounds, but on that flight its important cargo was a liver small enough to fit inside a box packed with ice.The plane landed at Ellington Field within a few hours. At noon, the organ was handed over to another group of soldiers. They drove it towards Texas Children\u2019s Hospital in a military vehicle.The liver then reached Goss, who was waiting to perform the transplant. By that evening, Kareena had received the organ.\u201cEven though there was the horrific event and it was meant to hurt a lot of people, there were still very good people who were not going to let it completely hurt us,\u201d Goss said. \u201cIn the end, the good will win.\u201dFor Grandas, the successful journey of the organ was possible because everyone involved continued to find a way forward.\u201cNobody ever said no,\u201d she said. \u201cNot the staff at the hospital, not the FAA or the National Guard. We had a mission to get this liver to Houston. And we did.\u201d<\/p>\n The transplant gave Kareena the chance to grow up. Twenty-five years later, she is still living in the Houston area. She graduated from college and is now studying health policy in law school. She hopes to work in health equity. \u201cI want to make the most of the life that so many strangers worked to give me,\u201d she said.Kareena continues to remember the people who helped her survive. Every September 11, she calls Grandas in Nashville. The two met in person for the first time only recently, when Grandas travelled to Houston.On September 11, 2026, Kareena also returned to Texas Children\u2019s Hospital, where Goss had performed the transplant 25 years earlier. The two have reunited several times since the surgery, although they had not met for a couple of years.Kareena greeted Goss with a hug and later took a selfie with him for her mother. But both said the story was bigger than their reunion.The liver had come from a Tennessee family that had lost an infant on the night of September 10, 2001. In the middle of that loss, the family chose to donate the infant\u2019s organ so another child could live.\u201cThey didn\u2019t just save a life,\u201d Kareena said. \u201cThey created a family. They created friendships, communities,\u201d she added.<\/div>\n Dr Goss with little Kareena after her successful surgery On September 11, 2001, while the US was dealing with the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, a six-month-old baby in Houston was fighting for her life. Kareena needed a liver transplant, but the donor organ was nearly 800 miles away in Nashville, and the civilian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23673,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-31"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-small":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-small-tall":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-small-square":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-small-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-medium-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg","blogsy-wide":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"Dr Goss with little Kareena after her successful surgery On September 11, 2001, while the US was dealing with the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people, a six-month-old baby in Houston was fighting for her life. Kareena needed a liver transplant, but the donor organ was nearly 800 miles away in Nashville, and the civilian […]","magazineBlocksPostCategories":["\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36"],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":2,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":5,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg",400,225,false],"medium":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg",300,169,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/dr-goss-with-little-kareena-after-her-successful-surgery.jpg",150,84,false]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/author\/admin"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36<\/a>","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Transplant disrupted by 9\/11<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
![\"Kareena](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/photo\/imgsize-46816,msid-134192537\/kareena-takes-selfie-with-the-doctor-who-saved-her-life-25-years-ago.jpg\" "\\"Kareena")
<\/p>\nMilitary plane carried the tiny liver<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Kareena remembers her saviours<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"