2000 Fan whistling at high fan speed
 

I have a 6-7 hour road trip coming up at the end of the month. Going to be hot, I'll be riding with my nice and chilled AC blasting. Unfortunately, there's a pretty loud whistling sound coming from the vents when the fan is blowing hard.
There's a youtube video of a guy "fixing" this problem by popping the center vents out, reaching in with some long needlenose pliers in, and tearing up a mesh filter to remove it.
Are there any other main suspects for this whistle? Is there a better way to get this filter out without reaching so far?

Thanks

Where is the noise? Have tried selecting other vents to lower the noise?