US woman flees Middle East to reach critically ill husband in California

Judith Wilson of Walnut Creek, California, had been stranded in Dubai for the last few days on a business trip while her husband, Doug, prepared for emergency heart surgery back home.She’d been desperately trying to get out of the Middle East amid the Iran operation.“My husband went to the ER Monday with back pain and was diagnosed with a heart condition,” Wilson told Fox News Digital.He was immediately scheduled for open-heart surgery — while she was thousands of miles from home. On Wednesday, Wilson’s colleague got word a flight was going to take off.

So Wilson “sprinted to the airport and called the travel agency,” she said.“I got the very last seat to London’s Heathrow Airport,” she said.Like many other American travelers, Wilson had been trapped in Dubai since the beginning of the Iran operation over the weekend.The mother of two college-age boys became very anxious when she started seeing alerts on her phone Saturday evening.“The real fright was [on] Saturday evening,” she said.

“There were 1,000 people in the lobby of the JW Marriott, and as many devices rang out.”She added, “Americans were definitely scared.”Wilson, 57, a software sales executive, said she was on a business trip when she heard about the war.“On Saturday, I was with some colleagues at the Atlantis hotel,” she said.“We heard huge explosions.”She described the mood as concerned, but still “business-as-usual.”“It was kind of like when turbulence hits, and you see the flight attendants are calm — so you figure you should be too,” she said.Even so, she described a scene Saturday night in which many travelers were crying in the hotel lobby as people huddled together.There were “regular booms” during her time in Dubai, she said.

She saw plumes of smoke. There was no bunker in the hotel, she said, but the staff set up lobby couches with blankets, so hotel guests could remain together and try to get some sleep.By Monday, the mood normal...