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(NewsNation) — The search continues for Hannah Kobayashi, a Hawaiian woman who disappeared after missing a connecting flight to New York at the Los Angeles International Airport.
Loved ones have flown to California to form a search party following concerning texts and radio silence from Kobayashi, with volunteers joining the mission as the case grows nationally.
According to the Los Angeles Police Department’s Missing Persons Unit, Kobayashi is 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighs about 140 pounds. She has brown hair and eyes and fair skin with freckles as well as a tattoo that says “knife” on her forearm.
Here’s a timeline retracing key moments in Kobayashi’s disappearance.
Hannah Kobayashi misses connecting flight
Nov. 8, 2024: On a trip from Hawaii to New York, Kobayashi misses her connecting flight at LAX.
She tells her family she will sleep at the airport that night, with many of her loved ones assuming she’s on standby for another plane to New York.
Hannah Kobayashi visits The Grove shopping mall
Nov. 9, 2024: The next day, Hannah texted them to say she was sightseeing in Los Angeles, planning to visit The Grove shopping mall and downtown LA, her aunt, Larie Pidgeon, told The Associated Press.
Hannah Kobayashi attends Nike event
Nov. 10, 2024: Kobayashi posted to Instagram from a Nike event at the same shopping center.
A video obtained by the family shows Hannah Kobayashi strolling through the event that day wearing headphones.
Hannah Kobayashi texts family; phone turns off
Nov. 11, 2024: The Monday after she missed her connecting flight, Kobayashi returned to LAX, according to a USA Today interview with Pidgeon. She told the outlet that Kobayashi spoke to an American Airlines agent between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m., but never boarded a flight.
That same day, Kobayashi sends her family “strange” and “alarming” texts.
One said: “I got hacked, stripped of my identity, I can’t fly.”
Another reads: “I got tricked pretty much into giving away my funds for someone I thought I loved. I’ve been on the streets.”
Pidgeon told NewsNation her niece’s phone has been off since the day those texts were sent.
“No one has heard from her. Not a single person has heard from her. And that is unlike Hannah. Hannah checks in,” Pidgeon explained.
“I speak to her two to three times a week. You know, about music, about dancing, you know, a sunset that she saw. You know, she’s just that person. She’s so communicative,” she added.
Surveillance footage shows Hannah Kobayashi
Nov. 11, 2024: Family members say Kobayashi was spotted on surveillance video around 10 p.m. in downtown LA near the Pico Metro Station. That’s roughly a block away from the Crypto.com Arena and near LAX.
Pidgeon said the unreleased surveillance footage showed Kobayashi was not alone and that she did not look well in the video. Kobayashi was wearing the same clothing she had worn when she arrived from Maui.
Pidgeon told NewsNation that Kobayashi had “no reason” to visit the metro stop so late at night “unless she was misled, unless she was forced to or, unfortunately, now we’re thinking, unless she was drugged.”
It’s unknown when the surveillance video was shown to Kobayashi’s family, and it has not yet been released to the public.
Family files missing person report for Kobayashi
Nov. 12: Following the alarming texts, Kobayashi’s family files a formal missing persons report in California.
The LAPD Missing Persons Unit posts on social media about her disappearance.
Concerned loved ones rally outside Crypto.com Arena
Nov. 21, 2024: The rally, held just blocks from where Kobayashi was last seen, calls for her return home. It takes place the same day as the Los Angeles Lakers and Orlando Magic’s game, a move to hopefully find new leads in her case.
Since there is no hard evidence of a crime or foul play, the family fears her case is not a priority to officers.
Hannah Kobayashi’s aunt: Police taking case seriously
Nov. 22, 2024: Pidgeon tells NewsNation’s “Banfield” that the entire family is playing the “waiting game” as police have started taking her disappearance more seriously.
Hannah Kobayashi’s father found dead near LAX
Nov. 24, 2024: Ryan Kobayashi, the father of missing woman Hannah Kobayashi, was found dead in a parking lot near Los Angeles International Airport around 4 a.m.
In a statement posted on Facebook by the RAD Movement, a nonprofit organization that works to find people, the organization confirmed the 58-year-old “tragically took his own life.” The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office and LAPD confirmed his identity.
The family said the loss has compounded their suffering “immeasurably.”
“What the family needs most in this difficult time is for all communities to rally around them with support, compassion, and prayers,” the statement said. “Please be considerate with your comments and posts. The trauma they are enduring is profound, and they now face the additional burden of grieving the loss of their family’s pillar and navigating next steps.”
NewsNation’s Nancy Loo and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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