Outdoorsman and now Nobel Prize winner Dr. Fred Ramsdell was enjoying an off-grid camping trip with his wife and their dogs when he realized he’d missed some pretty important phone calls. The couple was in Montana when Ramsdell’s wife, Laura O’Neill, suddenly got service and realized her husband had been awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Medicine, alongside two other people.
Ramsdell won the prestigious award for his research on humans’ immune systems. The Nobel Prize committee called his (and his co-recipients’) discoveries around peripheral immune tolerance “groundbreaking.”
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In an interview describing the chaotic scene, Ramsdell said he was in disbelief upon realizing what had happened while they were out exploring nature.
“My wife started screaming ‘oh, my God! Oh, my God!’” he explained. “And I said ‘what?’ And she said ‘you won the Nobel Prize!’ And I said, ‘no, I didn’t.’ And she says, ‘yes, you did. I have 200 text messages saying you won the Nobel Prize!’”
Ramsdell said they had spotty service during their trip, and he hadn’t expected any important phone calls, so he had put his phone in airplane mode. Whoops!
See Ramsdell (and watch his interview about learning he won the Nobel Prize while camping) below:
Watch the interview here:
Header stock image by Westhoff/Getty Images