A woman from Connecticut went missing during a hiking trip in Japan in April 2023. Despite a search effort involving multiple organizations, authorities could not locate her. On Friday, May 9, 2025, her family got the news they had dreaded since her disappearance.
Videos by Suggest
Pattie Wu-Murad disappeared while hiking alone in central Japan. Her husband, Kirk Murad, shared the news on Facebook and a timeline of events. Murad writes, “Although we had tried to prepare ourselves for this outcome, the finality of this news is heartbreaking. It offers a measure of closure, but many questions remain unanswered, including the exact circumstances and cause of Pattie’s death. We now begin the process of working through international protocols to bring her remains home.”
Murad explains that Pattie went missing on April 10, 2023. A massive ‘international search effort’ began. 24 American search and rescue experts assisted, as well as law enforcement from the US and Japan. Despite their best efforts, the hunt yielded no results. Murad says that the family heard nothing for over a year. In September 2024, a fisherman found Pattie’s backpack and one shoe near a different hiking trail from the one investigators believed she was using at the time. The discovery prompted another search by Japanese authorities, but they found no more clues.
Investigators In The Hiking Case Made A Grim Discovery
Murad’s post says that a member of the US search and rescue team explored the area where the fisherman retrieved Pattie’s backpack on April 27, 2025. He found more of Pattie’s belongings and ‘what appeared to be a femur.’
Japanese police confirmed the remains were human, with a DNA match to Pattie. In an interview with NBC Connecticut, Kirk Murad explained that the family finally had time to grieve. “We never really grieved her passing. Always hoping, y’know, that 0.1 percent chance that she might still be alive.” Murad thanked the search teams in the US and Japan for their efforts in his Facebook post. He reportedly told NBC, “These people are just amazing human beings. And they worked well with the family. They had compassion. They had empathy.” Murad explains that the family is working through international protocols to bring her remains back home.