Remains of missing Park hiker ID'd

The tale of a man from Malaysia who went missing in Glacier National Park in 2008 has come to a close. Park officials last week said an analysis of bone fragments found last summer matched those of Yi-Jien Hwa.

The match was made by the National Missing Persons Program at the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification. Several pieces of clothing that were also found closely matched items in Hwa’s equipment list.

Hwa, 27, was in the U.S. on a student visa and was a seminary student studying in Kentucky. Park officials notified Hwa’s family and closed the investigation. The Park also extended sympathy to the family for its loss.

Hwa embarked on an ambitious 96.6-mile trip across the Park that started with the Floral Park Traverse from Sperry Campground on Aug. 11, 2008. The traverse is an off-trail journey from Sperry to Logan Pass popular with mountaineers. The route can be dangerous, particularly if a person falls into a crevasse on Sperry Glacier or takes the wrong route through the cliffs and gullies.

Hwa then planned on a long journey northward that would have eventually led him to Kintla Lake one week later. But Hwa died while hiking the Floral Park Traverse. With just bone fragment remains and a few tattered clothes, it’s impossible to tell the exact cause of death.

The Park started a comprehensive search but never found Hwa. Last summer, however, hiker John Wagner set out with his son Christopher to see if it was possible to climb from Avalanche Lake to the Floral Park area.

The two climbed a gully through brush and dry creek bed on the east side of the lake’s headwall when John fond a nylon strap, according to a story he wrote for “The Inside Trail,” a publication of stories written by members of the Glacier Park Foundation.

A bit farther on their journey, John found black long johns. The Wagners’ trip ended after they hit snow, but they reported their findings to Park rangers, who investigated further that summer, finding the bone fragments and other materials.

The analysis of their findings took almost a year. The bone fragments matched a “family reference sample,” Park spokeswoman Denise Germann said.