{"id":508021,"date":"2026-05-29T03:15:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T03:15:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/508021\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T03:15:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T03:15:19","slug":"hiker-dad-sent-terrifying-four-word-message-before-he-and-his-family-all-found-dead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/508021\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiker dad sent terrifying four word message before he and his family all found dead"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Gerrish, his wife, Ellen Chung, and their one-year-old daughter Miju, were found dead in a baffling scene in a National Park. It took months for authorities to work our what had happened.<\/p>\n

Emilia Randall<\/strong> GAU Writer<\/p>\n

07:00, 28 May 2026<\/p>\n

\"Jonathan<\/p>\n

Jonathan Gerrish, his partner Ellen Chung and their one-year-old daughter (Image: Rossana Heaslett)<\/p>\n

A mysterious set of circumstances<\/a> led to the death <\/a>of a couple, their baby daughter and their dog on a hike – with the father sending a chilling and desperate final message before the bodies were found.<\/a><\/p>\n

Jonathan Gerrish, 45, Ellen Chung, 31, their one-year-old daughter Aurelia Miju Chung-Gerrish and their dog Oski, eight, set out on an eight-mile hike in California\u2019s Sierra National Forest. The temperature reached 42\u00b0C.<\/p>\n

All four were found dead on a remote hiking trail on August 18, 2022. Despite the FBI working tirelessly to discover more about what happened to the family – their phone records revealed the truth of their horrifying last moments.<\/p>\n

There was no mobile reception where the family was discovered, but records show Jonathan had tried to send multiple text messages.<\/p>\n

One heart-breaking attempt read: \u201cCan you help us.\u201d The father also tried to make five phone calls, none were to emergency services. Ellen\u2019s body was found further up the trail and it looked as if they had all sat down in the sun, according to Strange Outdoors.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Jonathan<\/p>\n

Police investigating their deaths have said they had ‘never seen a case like this'(Image: REX\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n

The family\u2019s babysitter raised the alarm two days before they were found when she turned up to look after their daughter and found no one at home.<\/p>\n

She contacted their family who then reported the three missing that night. Search and rescue teams first found the family\u2019s car, but were initially baffled at the cause of death when they found their bodies.<\/p>\n

Mariposa County Sheriff’s spokeswoman Kristie Mitchell said, “Coming across a scene where everyone involved, including the family dog that is deceased, that is not a typical thing that we have seen or other agencies have seen. That is why we’re treating it as a hazmat situation. We just don’t know.”<\/p>\n

Mariposa County, Sheriff Jeremy Briese said: \u201cWhen we located the family there were no apparent causes of death.”<\/p>\n

Multiple causes of death ruled out over the course of the investigation including: suicide, being caused by a gun or other weapon, alcohol, illegal drugs, a lightning strike, extreme heat and exposure to cyanide, carbon monoxide or carbon dioxide, according to The Fresno Bee<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Jonathan<\/p>\n

Their beloved dog had also died of heat exhaustion(Image: REX\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n

Briese, said: \u201cI\u2019ve been here for 20 years and I\u2019ve never seen a death, with any case, like this. There are no obvious indicators of how it occurred . . . you have two healthy adults, you have a healthy child and what appeared to be a healthy canine all within a general same area, deceased. It\u2019s frustrating and we\u2019re not going to rest . . . it\u2019s devastating to everyone\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonathan, a Lancashire man who moved to the US to work for Google had texted someone saying: \u201cOn savage lundy trail heading back to Hites cove trail. No water or ver [over] heating with baby.\u201d<\/p>\n

Briese previously said one empty water bladder backpack was found with the families\u2019 bodies alongside some snacks and baby formula, but they had no other water containers with them.<\/p>\n

Two months later, after autopsies and extensive investigations, it looked like the family had simply run out of water and shelter.<\/p>\n

The Mariposa County Sheriff\u2019s Office released messages supporting the the coroner\u2019s ruling that the family died due to environmental exposure.<\/p>\n

In October of that year, Briese said what happened was \u201can unfortunate and tragic event due to the weather.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photos recovered from the phone showed the family left for the walk at 7.45am, with the final image of a creek taken at around 12pm.<\/p>\n

Mariposa County Sheriff Jeremy Briese said: \u201cThe cell phone data results were the last thing both the family and detectives were waiting on. The extracted information confirms our initial findings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am very proud of my team and our partner agencies for all the work they put in. Their dedication has allowed us to close this case and answer lingering questions the family had, bringing them a little peace.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tragically, the family had completed most of the hike before they died. One theory circulating was they were killed by toxic algae found in the nearby water.<\/p>\n

Investigators worked with toxicology experts to determine whether the algae could have poisoned the family. Sheriff Briese confirmed there was \u201cno evidence they drank any of that water\u201d.<\/p>\n

The area around the trail was also known to contain mines. Sheriff Briese said one mine was also located close to where the family were found but that there was no evidence the family had come into contact with it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"John Gerrish, his wife, Ellen Chung, and their one-year-old daughter Miju, were found dead in a baffling scene…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":508022,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,13,14,6,66695,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":["post-508021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-headlines","tag-inquests","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-world","tag-world-news","tag-worldnews"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116655694572071813","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=508021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508021\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/508022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=508021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=508021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=508021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}