She Vanished 3 Separate Times And Hasn’t Been Seen In 4 Years

Chip Chick |

Dec 5, 2021

New York, New York. To go missing once is chilling enough, but going missing three separate times? That’s exactly what happened to Hannah Upp…and she hasn’t been seen since 2017.

Let’s start at the beginning, with the very first time Hannah up and vanished. Towards the end of August in 2008, Hannah was 23-years-old. She was living in New York City and working as a Spanish teacher.

The school year was about to start, but Hannah didn’t show up for it.

On Friday, August 29th, Hannah’s debit card confirmed she had gone by herself to see a movie at a theatre located in Times Square. Over that weekend, she was going to be in Philadelphia, visiting her mom.

But when Monday rolled around and Hannah didn’t come back to her Hamilton Heights apartment, her two roommates began to freak out, especially after they looked into her room and made a shocking discovery.

Hannah had left all her personal belongings behind. Her cellphone, her purse, her Metrocard, her passport, her keys were all there in the apartment, but Hannah was not.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above

The police were quickly contacted to look into where she had gone. Hannah’s friends came together to hang flyers up around the city about her disappearance. Her mom came up from Philadelphia.

The media picked up her alarming story. All of New York City was on the lookout for this lovely young teacher who had to have been met with some kind of foul play.

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Almost two weeks after her disappearance, she was spotted on surveillance footage at the Apple Store in midtown.

She was dressed in workout gear and had her hair swept up in a ponytail. Two days after that, Hannah was seen in a Starbucks.

After being missing for three weeks, Hannah was found floating face down in the water not far from the Statue of Liberty.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above on a boat

Miraculously, Hannah was alive when she was pulled out of the water by the crew of the Staten Island ferry that had seen her floating by.

She was not in good shape, but she was breathing.

She had suffered terrible sunburn to one-half of her body, she was severely dehydrated and she also had hypothermia.

As Hannah laid there in the hospital bed recovering, she eventually mentioned the last thing that came to mind was going running in Riverside Park.

She had no idea what had happened after that, but she remembered everything about her life before that.

So where had Hannah gone for all those days and why couldn’t she remember?

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above hiking

Doctors tried to figure out if Hannah had any underlying medical conditions that might explain her memory loss, but they kept coming up with nothing physical that would cause it.

Hannah was ultimately diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder: dissociative fugue. This disorder basically causes someone to forget who they are.

Someone with dissociative fugue will frequently leave home without warning and might even take on a new identity. It’s extraordinarily rare to be diagnosed with this, and it’s caused by severe trauma or stress.

The strange thing is Hannah didn’t have any severe trauma in her childhood or in her adult life. She wasn’t severely stressed out about the start of the school year. In fact, she was anxious to get back to it after landing in the hospital.

And she did get back to school and back to her life for several years…before she disappeared for a second time.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above with long hair

It was now September of 2013. Hannah had moved from New York City to Kensington, Maryland. She was working at a Montessori school, but on the first day she was due to start classes, she didn’t make it in.

Her cellphone and her purse were found lying in a wooded area and she was nowhere to be found. Two days later, Hannah called her mom after asking to use someone’s cellphone. She had been sitting in a creek with a shopping cart when it all came back to her.

Interestingly enough, both times Hannah up and vanished, she was supposed to start teaching again after having the summer off. She also ended up in the water on each occasion as well.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above at a school event

Around a year after her second disappearance, Hannah decided to move again. This time, she headed to St. Thomas, which is part of the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Hannah had landed a job teaching at a Montessori school, and she felt that she was headed to paradise with her next career move.

Hannah made it to the first day of school on the island. She made it to the second day too. Things were going great for her and she had even taken up swimming in the ocean every single day.

A week after Hannah started school there, Hurricane Irma came crashing through the island on September 6th, 2017.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above with a friend

The hurricane caused a lot of damage to St. Thomas and also ruined Hannah’s house, but she was ok. Then, a few days afterward, Hurricane Maria was headed their way.

Hannah’s roommates insisted on leaving before the next hurricane hit, but Hannah refused. She loved where she lived, she loved the kids she taught, and she couldn’t abandon everything despite the danger.

The morning following that conversation about staying and going, Hannah got into her car and drove off to go to school. She never got there though.

Over the next few days, her roommates and friends looked for her until they had to quit and wait the hurricane out. After Hurricane Maria had passed over, the hunt for Hannah was back on.

Alarmingly enough, her friends discovered her car keys and clothes at a bar located near Sapphire beach, one of her favorite places to be.

Facebook; Hannah is pictured above with a plate of sushi

Staff at the bar had found Hannah’s things covered in beach sand following Hurricane Maria. Hannah’s car was sitting right there in the bar parking lot, and her cellphone, wallet, passport, and purse were inside of it.

The hunt for Hannah proved exceedingly difficult. Given the damage St. Thomas had suffered and the fact that many people were missing or deceased, it made it even harder to help find her.

Hannah’s loved ones created a Facebook page for her, and posted on September 19th, “Hannah Upp has been missing since Thursday morning, 9/14 in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. Her car has been found at Sapphire Beach Bar with her cell phone in it and her keys were found near the beach.”

“If anyone sees Hannah, please go to her. She has a rare dissociative amnesia disorder that may be in play. If so, she may not know where she is, or who she is.”

“Police and Coast Guard are searching, but their resources are stretched thin with the impending Hurricane Maria. Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers. Any information should go directly to Mr. Borrn via text at 340.626.0047. He is working closely with the authorities. You may also contact Maggie Guzman at 340-474-9774.”

A GoFundMe campaign was started to help pay for a private investigator to help locate Hannah.

The page reads, “Hannah Upp, a beloved Montessori teacher, daughter, sister, and friend, has been missing since September 14, 2017, from St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. She disappeared between the devastating hurricanes Irma and Maria. We have been looking for her since.”

Facebook; Hannah smiles in the photo above

“This campaign, initiated by Hannah’s mother, Barbara, and supported by loving family and friends, is to pay for the services of a professional private investigator to continue the search for Hannah. We have now exhausted the resources of the Virgin Islands Police Department, Search and Rescue, the Coast Guard, and the FBI. We are working to expand the investigation– our best hope in the long run for locating Hannah.”

“All funds raised will go directly to this search. Thank you for considering your support. We are grateful for all donations of any size.”

To this day, Hannah is still missing. Did she tragically pass away in Hurricane Maria? Did she make it off St. Thomas safely?

Was she able to board one of the boats that evacuated before the hurricane hit? If so, she could be in Puerto Rico, Florida, St. Croix, or the Bahamas. Hannah could still be out there, somewhere.

If you have any information on Hannah’s whereabouts please contact the Virgin Islands Police Department at 340-772-5605 or private investigator Steve Wagner at [email protected] or 724-591-0675.