A 17-year mystery has been solved after DNA testing identified human remains found on a remote Alaska island as those of a hunter who disappeared after his snow machine broke through river ice.
Alaska State Troopers announced July 14 that remains discovered on Nunivak Island in October 2009 have been positively identified as George Smith Sr. of Togiak.
Smith was 79 when he disappeared April 30, 2009. Troopers said Smith and a companion were hunting on snow machines when Smith’s machine broke through the ice on the Ungalikthluk River near Togiak.
Immediate searches and later efforts failed to locate Smith or his snow machine, and he was presumed dead.
The breakthrough came earlier this year. In February, Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons investigators collected about a half-dozen DNA samples from family members while working to identify several missing people from the Dillingham and Togiak area.
Those samples were processed through the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, known as NamUs, resulting in a DNA match to the remains found in 2009.
The identification came 17 years after Smith disappeared.
Troopers said Smith’s next of kin have been notified.
Photo: Pixabay,
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