When the Skies Close, the Sea Opens: A Maritime Lifeline Brings Rambam Staff Home
- RHCC
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Six Rambam Health Care Campus (Rambam) staff returned to Israel aboard a ZIM Integrated Shipping Services vessel in a special maritime mission following the closure of Israeli airspace due to Operation Roaring Lion.
With Israel’s airspace closed due to the war with Iran, 18 employees from Rambam Health Care Campus, Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, and the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya found themselves stranded abroad, unable to return home to resume their essential duties during a national emergency. In the early hours of Tuesday morning, as a barrage of missiles from Lebanon sent residents of Northern Israel into bomb shelters, a ZIM cargo ship carrying doctors and healthcare workers sailed from Cyprus to Haifa.
Among those returning to Rambam were Gila Hyams, director of Nursing and director of the Teaching Center for Trauma, Emergency, and Mass Casualty Situations (MCS); Nissim Haim, Chief Operating Officer; Dr. Dana Vitner, director of the Maternal-Fetal Medicine (MFM) Outpatient Clinics; Dr. Arik Shechter, a physician in the Department of Urology; Margarita Katz, nurse in the Cardiac ICU; and Esam Mousa, deputy head technician in the Department of Medical Imaging. All six were abroad when flights to Israel were suspended and had to make complex travel arrangements to reach Limassol, Cyprus, where they joined a maritime repatriation voyage on a ZIM cargo ship.
Photography: Courtesy of Gila Hyams
Hyams had been in Latin America leading an emergency preparedness and mass casualty response training for senior medical teams in Costa Rica, which included advanced simulations designed to help healthcare systems respond to complex disasters and wartime scenarios. She then traveled to Mexico to present at a professional conference about her experiences working in emergency preparedness and operating the Fortified Underground Emergency Hospital (FUEH) during times of conflict.
When the security situation escalated and Israeli hospitals began activating emergency protocols, Hyams was already on her way back to Israel, traveling from Mexico to Frankfurt. While in the air, Hyams asked a flight attendant for an update about what was happening in Israel and learned that Operation Roaring Lion had begun—all flights to Israel had been cancelled. Upon landing in Frankfurt, Hyams learned about a repatriation voyage for medical personnel being organized from Cyprus. That same evening, she flew to Athens and then to Larnaca before continuing to Limassol, where she took a taxi to the port.
The other remaining Rambam staff members also undertook convoluted journeys across Europe in order to reach Cyprus, where they joined the vessel bringing medical professionals back to Israel. The sea voyage to Haifa lasted approximately 15 hours and provided a critical alternative for returning essential medical personnel while commercial flights remained suspended.
During the crossing, the teams received word that missiles had been fired toward Cyprus. Then, with Haifa only minutes away and exhaustion giving way to urgency, the ship was forced to wait offshore for about two hours before it could dock, delayed by a missile barrage from the north.
Their arrival comes as Rambam has activated its full emergency protocols and transferred hundreds of patients into the FUEH, which is now fully operational and providing continuous care in protected conditions.
The rapid return of Rambam’s staff reflects the deep commitment of the hospital’s medical professionals, many of whom cut short international travel in order to return to Haifa and support their colleagues and patients during a time of national need. As the largest tertiary medical center in Northern Israel and a national strategic asset, Rambam continues to deliver uninterrupted medical care to patients across the region despite the ongoing security situation.
Based on an article that first appeared on the Walla News website.
