Grey's Anatomy Fans Worry Meredith Is About To Suffer Yet Another Tragedy

Spoilers ahead for Grey’s Anatomy Season 19, Episode 5. Over the past nearly two decades, Grey’s Anatomy has put Meredith Grey through the wringer, to say the least. She’s survived everything from a near-drowning, a plane crash, the grief of Derek’s death, and, most recently, a COVID-induced coma. Now that the Nov. 3 episode confirmed that Meredith is moving to Boston, fans on Twitter think she has at least one more disaster in store before leaving Seattle. After all, the cryptic Season 19 fall finale promo teased that tragedy will strike “one of our own” amid a catastrophic lightning storm.

Even before the sneak peek dropped, several viewers had already discovered an unverified still from the upcoming Nov. 10 installment, seemingly showing Meredith standing in front of what appears to be her home burning — along with a lifetime of history. Of course, Grey’s is known for its fake-outs and dream sequences, not to mention there’s no evidence to suggest it’s actually Meredith’s house. Given that Station 19 firefighter Andy Herrera and Meredith’s son Bailey also appear to be in the image though, it looks a little too real for comfort, sadly.

What’s also sadly real is that Meredith will be informing her Grey Sloan colleagues via email that she’s relocating to Boston, where daughter Zola can attend a more specialized school. Oh yeah, and during the mother-daughter duo’s East Coast visit, Jackson (director and guest star Jesse Williams) also offered her a job working on a cure for Alzheimer's disease, which didn’t exactly hurt either.

Of course, Meredith’s impending departure isn’t exactly news to Grey’s devotees, though it wasn’t until Episode 5 that we learned exactly where she would be going. Before Season 19 kicked off, Ellen Pompeo announced that she would only appear in eight episodes, though she’ll continue to provide her usual voiceover narration. The reason for the star and executive producer’s reduced onscreen role is that she’s starring in an untitled Hulu limited series about a Midwestern couple’s adoption gone wrong, in addition to developing several other projects as a producer.

Prior to the revelation that Zola’s panic attacks were related to her way above-average intellect, Grey’s showrunner Krista Vernoff hinted that Meredith’s children would be the reason for her exit. “When you’ve got a woman who has a job that she loves, a career that she loves, a man that she loves, what is the thing that might take her out of the main storytelling?” she asked rhetorically in an October Variety interview. “And my answer to that is: her kids. Something happens with her kids that changes the course of her plans for her life. And as a mother, I resonate with that.”

A month earlier, Pompeo insisted she wouldn’t be gone for good, though. “I’ll be back at Grey’s for the finale, and we’ll see if we can keep it going,” she said on Sept. 9, insisting that the show “will be just fine” without her. “I’m going to always be a part of that show — I’m an exec producer on that show, I’ve spent two decades of my career on that show, it’s my heart and soul, and I’ll never truly be gone as long as that show’s on the air.”