{"id":201612,"date":"2026-04-18T07:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-18T07:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201612\/"},"modified":"2026-04-18T07:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T07:03:08","slug":"missing-washington-state-mother-hailey-athay-remains-found-by-hikers-in-kelso","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/201612\/","title":{"rendered":"Missing Washington State mother Hailey Athay remains found by hikers in Kelso"},"content":{"rendered":"

A pair of hikers in Washington state discovered the skeletal remains of a missing mother of three who was last known to be picking mushrooms with a strange man before Thanksgiving in 2024.<\/p>\n

Hailey Athay, 33, was confirmed as the person found in a remote area of Kelso, Washington on Sunday after two hikers stumbled across two bones and a piece of clothing, the Cowlitz Sheriff\u2019s Office<\/a> announced Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The grim discovery was made just north of the Oregon border.<\/p>\n

\"HaileyHailey Athay\u2019s remains were discovered in a remote area of Kelso, Washington, on April 12, 2026.<\/p>\n

Because of the time of day, officials couldn\u2019t journey out to Athay\u2019s resting site until the next day, but asked the hikers to snap a photo of the bones that was later sent to a forensic anthropologist.<\/p>\n

The bones were confirmed as human and the next day one of the hikers led a search party off officials to the undisclosed area off Rose Valley Road where they recovered even more bones.<\/p>\n

\u201cNearly complete skeletal remains were located as well as multiple items of clothing and personal belongings,\u201d the sheriff\u2019s office said. <\/p>\n

Sheriff\u2019s office officials confirmed the area had been identified as \u201can area of interest\u201d in Athay\u2019s disappearance, but previous searches had resulted in zero discoveries.<\/p>\n

Officials sent the skull to a forensics lab that confirmed the remains belonged to Athay by comparing dental records of the missing mother.<\/p>\n

\"Athay'sAthay\u2019s body was confirmed by forensic officials using dental records. Cowlitz County Sheriff\u0092s Office<\/p>\n

Athay was reported missing by her family in January 2025, over a month after she last talked to her mother, Nicole Brooks, from a store just before Thanksgiving in 2024.<\/p>\n

Brooks says her daughter told her she \u201cwas doing well\u201d and was with a man the mother didn\u2019t know, Fox 13 Seattle reported.<\/a><\/p>\n

Athay had told a friend she was going to pick mushrooms with the man before her disappearance, according to the outlet.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI can hear her\u2014\u2018Hi, Mama\u2019\u2014and it just breaks my heart that I won\u2019t hear that again,\u201d Brooks told KPTV.<\/a><\/p>\n

News of her daughter\u2019s death did not surprise Brooks but still left her distraught.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that it was unexpected that this would be the outcome, but it certainly isn\u2019t what we wanted in our hearts,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was a nightmare. It was just a nightmare. You don\u2019t know, and you hold out hope\u2014and the longer it goes, the harder it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Athay\u2019s cause and manner of death were not revealed as officials continue to investigate her disappearance, the sheriff\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n

She leaves behind three daughters who are now living with family members.<\/p>\n

No criminal charges have been announced in Athay\u2019s death.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A pair of hikers in Washington state discovered the skeletal remains of a missing mother of three who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1015,29796,4081,7373,9,11,10,58,25436],"class_list":{"0":"post-201612","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-deaths","9":"tag-hiking","10":"tag-human-remains","11":"tag-missing-persons","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-news","15":"tag-us-news","16":"tag-washington-state"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}