STEVENSON, Wash. - An emergency team is set to recover the body of a missing woman whose remains were discovered Saturday in the Columbia River Gorge by hikers.
Kate Huether had been missing since March 4 when she went hiking near Bonneville Dam in Washington's Skamania County. Undersheriff Dave Cox said a man and his son found her her body wedged behind rocks at the base of an 800-foot cliff.
He said deputies confirmed the body was that of Huether but because of darkness and hazardous conditions authorities postponed recovering it until about Sunday.
Cox didn't disclose any information how Huether died, but he told the Oregonian that Huether appeared to have fallen from a cliff that is part of a steep rock face marking the site of the historic Bonneville Slide.
During a weeklong search, the only information that authorities had to go on was her car found at a trailhead and a credit card receipt with her name found about four miles north of Bonneville Dam.
The offiicial search for her ended last Wednesday but her father continued the friends and volunteers.
"This is my daughter," said Bob Huether said. "I'll do whatever I have to do until I'm convinced I can't do any more."
The 24-year-old PSU student disappeared last Thursday, after going for a hike near the Bonneville Dam. For days, search and rescue crews combed the "Table Mountain" area, searching from the ground, horseback and air. But with no new clues, the search was called off.
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