An 82-year-old woman who went missing along a remote forestry road in B.C.‘s Lower Mainland last fall has been found dead.
Langley RCMP announced Wednesday that the woman’s body had been located, adding that her death is not considered suspicious.
Police did not say where the woman was found or even share her name, but the file number on the news release matches previous police appeals for information on the whereabouts of Jane Whitehouse.
Whitehouse was reported missing from her home in Langley’s Aldergrove neighbourhood on Oct. 25, 2024.
Her Dodge Grand Caravan was found abandoned in a creek along the East Harrison forestry road two days later – puzzling her relatives, who had no idea why she might have driven there.
The most recent update on the case came in a November 2024 social media post shared by Melanie Sora on behalf of Whitehouse’s daughter Eileen, saying the search for Whitehouse had been suspended.
The post said the missing senior’s shoes had been found in the area near where her vehicle was located. They were recovered in two separate locations – one near her van and the other down a spur road, off East Harrison, on a steep precipice.
Those discoveries, and other factors, led RCMP and search crews to determine Whitehouse “most likely slipped into the swollen waters of the creek and was carried further down,” according to the Facebook post.
“The chance of her surviving the fall into icy waters is pretty much non-existent. This is high altitude in the mountains with winter weather setting in. There’s snow and it’s now too dangerous to try to locate her,” the update said.
Even if Whitehouse did not fall into the water, authorities believe she likely would have succumbed to hypothermia.
The family thanked the multiple RCMP detachments and numerous search and rescue teams that helped in the effort to locate Whitehouse, as well as the friends and community members who spread the word about her disappearance.
On Wednesday, police told CTV News the family had requested privacy in the wake of the discovery of Whitehouse’s remains.
“The RCMP offers its condolences to the family and friends of the deceased,” police said in their statement.
With files from CTV News Vancouver’s Andrew Weichel
