Police in Canada have confirmed that human remains found in a partially frozen lake near a ski resort are that of missing Australian woman Alison Raspa.
25-year-old Raspa, originally from Perth, went missing four months ago after leaving a bar in the popular western Canadian ski resort town of Whistler, situated in the mountain ridges north of Vancouver.
Raspa was last seen on November 23rd last year after leaving work colleagues at the Three Below Restaurant and Lounge in downtown Whistler.
The young Australian woman had relocated to Canada in early 2017 on a working holiday, and had landed a job at the Westin Spa and Resort in Whistler, an area known to be extremely popular with Australian travellers and workers.
On the evening she disappeared, Raspa clocked off from her job at the Westin and met work friends at the Three Below bar a short distance away.
After leaving the bar, police state she stopped briefly to chat with a friend in a pedestrian-only area, then boarded a public bus to the nearby village of Creekside, where she was staying.
Despite living within a bus stop’s distance of where she disembarked, near a service station, police determined that Raspa sound found herself in trouble. Her jacket and backpack were discovered by police a short distance from the service station.
At 1:15am local time, Alison reportedly sent friends a text message telling them she was lost. Her phone was subsequently recovered in Alpha Lake Park, a few hundred metres from her bus stop. From there, she vanished.
A four month investigation and search for Alison turned up nothing until this past Friday, when a bystander discovered her remains in the thawing Alpha Lake. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police subsequently confirmed the body was indeed Alison’s, but asserts that there was no foul play involved.
A cause of death is still yet to be determined. The case has reportedly baffled police investigators.
