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Missing Teacher Goes Back to Find Where She Started
By
Jen Chung
Published Mar 1, 2009
Modified Mar 1, 2009
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By
Jen Chung
Published Mar 1, 2009
Modified Mar 1, 2009
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Last September, friends of a 23-year-old woman became worried when she had been missing for several days. However, Hannah Upp, a teacher at the Thurgood Marshall Academy and Pace graduate student, was spotted at the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue—she spoke to a fellow Pace student—raising questions about whether she wanted to be found. She was ultimately spotted in the water—and alive— off Staten Island two and a half weeks after she was last seen. Upp has said little since re-emerging—except to explain she suffered from "dissociative fugue" and thank her rescuers who rescued her... until now.
The NY Times City section has a long feature about Upp and her missing weeks. Apparently the condition "diagnosed in Ms. Upp is so uncommon that few psychiatrists ever see it. Characterized in part by sudden and unexpected travel combined with an inability to recall one’s past, dissociative fugue demonstrates the glasslike fragility of memory and identity."
During her disappearance, little is known, aside from the Apple Store appearance and sightings of her at New York Sports Club locations. It's believed she jumped into the water, from a pier in Chelsea, because she was so tired of walking—eventually swimming to Staten Island: "I’ve gone back over lunar records to figure out if there was a full moon then, which sounds right. At that point in the tidal records, the current would have been in my favor, so whether I was Olympic swimming or doggy paddling, I could have made it." The next day, she jumped into the water, where Staten Island Ferry captain Christopher Covella saw her and deckhands Michael Sabatino and Ephriam Washington lifted her face-down body from the water. Here's video of the crew discussing the rescue:
Deckhands talk of rescue near Staten Island Ferry
Upp, who is on leave from her job, told the Times, "It’s weird. How do you feel guilty for something you didn’t even know you did? It’s not your fault, but it’s still somehow you. So it’s definitely made me reconsider everything. Who was I before? Who was I then — is that part of me? Who am I now?" And she said of going to the community board meeting honoring Covella, Sabatino and Washington, "Everyone kept saying, ‘We’re so glad you’re alive; these things don’t end this way.’ Just to see how happy and proud they were, it was a huge honor.”
Tagged
Christopher Covella
dissociative fugue state
hannah upp
missing
si ferry
staten island ferry
Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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