After his Alaska Airlines flight was postponed due to the record U.S. winter storm, an Alaskan parent missed a life-saving opportunity to receive a replacement heart.
The University of Washington Medical Center notified Patrick Holland, who is suffering from congestive heart failure, on December 22 that he was the next in line for a heart transplant.
According to CNN, the 56-year-old had an 8-hour window to get to the airport in Fairbanks, Alaska for an overnight trip to Seattle for the heart transplant.
But when he arrived at the airport, he learned that the weather had forced the cancellation of his trip. The following aircraft had to be redirected despite the efforts of Alaska Airlines workers to get him on board.
Holland, however, would have missed the 8-hour window and the heart would have been handed to someone else.
Holland talked to King 5 and said, “I think I cried more that day than I have in my life, and exerted every emotion that I’ve never had.Â
I replied, ‘Thank God, there’s going to be a family that is saving someone’s dad, saving someone’s brother, saving someone’s, someone’s uncle, you know.'” to snap out of that rut.”
Holland plans to stay in Seattle for a while in the hopes that another heart will become available, one that will enable him to support his wife of 17 years and his seven children.
