The annual meeting of the American Society for Clinical ­Pathology was set to get underway in Boston at 8 a.m. Wednesday. Dr. Sujatha Balija, a pathologist in London, had made the trip across the pond earlier in the week, stopping in a Philadelphia suburb to visit her daughter, and planned to take a train to Boston in time for the meeting.

But then, Hurricane Sandy walloped the Northeast, starting Monday. Train service was halted. Ditto planes. And buses.