Planes, Trains and Automobiles: RSNA 2025 Travelers Brave Chicago's Historic Snowfall

“While many of my colleagues were scrambling to rebook connecting flights, I was relieved to have reserved a later backup,” she said. “I thought, great, I’m going to get there much later than I thought, but at least I’ll get there tonight.”

Devising a Creative Rerouting Plan

Meanwhile, RSNA Past President N. Reed Dunnick, MD, and his wife Marilyn Roubidoux, MD, a professor of radiology at the University of Michigan Medical School, in Ann Arbor, woke at 5:30 a.m. to make their 8:45 a.m. flight from Detroit to O’Hare. Dr. Dunnick was looking forward to attending the RSNA Past Presidents’ Dinner on Saturday evening.

“Once we checked the luggage, got through security and arrived at the appropriate gate, we saw that the flight was delayed—first just by half an hour, then until 10:00 a.m.,” he said. “We were allowed to board the flight, but an hour later, even though the plane was completely boarded, they canceled it.”

Emerging from the cramped cabin to the same gate they’d entered, Dr. Dunnick considered trying his luck with Milwaukee, where the storm hadn’t yet arrived in full force. A flight scheduled for 12:15 p.m. would connect them to the Amtrak Hiawatha Line, which could carry them comfortably to Chicago’s Union Station.

That flight was also delayed for more than an hour, as airport staff scrambled for a crew to push the plane out of the gate. Added to the time to de-ice the plane, the delay took the 3:00 p.m. train out of consideration, but Dr. Dunnick anticipated catching the 5:45 p.m. train.

To pass the intervening time, Dr. Dunnick and his wife went to the Delta Airlines Sky Club to have a small snack. “Interestingly, we ran into the lady who was sitting next to us on the first flight to O’Hare that was canceled,” Dr. Dunnick said. “She’d also been sitting next to us on the second flight to Milwaukee, and she said she was taking the Amtrak to Union Station—the same thing we planned.”

The woman, it turned out, was a GE representative, and she was also bound for RSNA 2025. “So, the three of us started traveling together,” Dr. Dunnick added.

Like Dr. Yousem, Thomas Helbich, MD, MSC, MBA, anticipated presenting at RSNA 2025 despite the snowy weather.

The pilot made a second approach, and then a third. “We didn’t go down very far the third time; I got the feeling the tower might have told him, ‘This ain’t happening,’” Dr. Yousem recalled.

He and his fellow passengers learned that they were being diverted to Cleveland to refuel. “So, we landed in Cleveland, and the flight attendants said to stick by the gate, so after we refuel we could make another attempt at the gate.”

After two hours of waiting, the flight was canceled, and the attendants were aiming for a new plane scheduled to leave much later, at 8:00 p.m.

“I have a lot of friends in Cleveland, and they were offering for me to stay over, but I was planning to make that 8:00 p.m. flight,” Dr. Yousem said. “Then I learned that there were 105 seats on that flight, and there were 130 of us. So, I said, ‘To hell with this—I’m renting an all-wheel drive car.’”

At the rental kiosk, Dr. Yousem told the attendant where he was heading. “He said, ‘Are you crazy? There’s a big storm there!’” Dr. Yousem said. “And, on the shuttle bus on the way to get the car, I heard that the I-70 highway was closed. There was a 25-car pileup, among other issues. We were all strategizing about possible routes through the backroads.”

Another Team Hits the Road

Back in Toronto, 14 miles across the city from Dr. Hanneman, M. Alejandra Bedoya, MD, was growing increasingly anxious about timing. 

She was scheduled to present a pediatric musculoskeletal US course during a RSNA Hands-On Lab on Sunday morning, one of the earliest sessions of RSNA 2025.

After her own canceled flight, she weighed her options at the Air Canada counter at Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, and the upcoming flights didn’t look promising.

“The only possible option was a flight through St. Louis, but there was a high chance they were going to cancel it too. The next available flight was Monday or Tuesday, and that wasn’t an option for me,” said Dr. Bedoya, a pediatric radiologist at SickKids Hospital in Toronto.

“My senses were telling me, ‘Just don’t go,’ and my husband was saying the same,” she said. “But I had made a commitment to presenting the workshop, and the attendees were counting on me, and I decided that I had to at least try. So, I accepted the trip through St. Louis, knowing that there was a high chance that it would get stuck in St. Louis.”

As she waited at the gate, Dr. Bedoya got a text from Aurélie D’Hont, MD, a fellow pediatric radiologist at SickKids.

“She said, ‘My flight got canceled, too. Do you want to drive?’”

Thus began another travel team up. Drs. Bedoya and D’Hont—originally from Colombia and Belgium, respectively—joined Maria Fernanda Dien Esquivel, MD, a pediatric interventional radiologist originally from Costa Rica; Dr. Esquivel’s friend Miguel from the Dominican Republic, and prior SickKids fellow Diana Veiga, MD, from Valencia, Spain.

With none of these regions being especially known for wintry weather, Dr. Bedoya stipulated that the vehicle they rented must be equipped with four-wheel drive and snow tires, and that only those who were comfortable driving would take the wheel for the 520-mile drive.

In part two of this series, the travelers encounter long drives, kind strangers and snowy obstacles on their journey to RSNA 2025.

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