Rescuers Resume Search Efforts for Missing Wash. Woman on Naked 'Spiritual Quest'
Maureen Kelly, 19, of Vancouver, Wash., was last seen Sunday evening.
June 15, 2013— -- Authorities today resumed their search for a 19-year-old woman who vanished into a Washington forest on a "spiritual quest" sporting only a fanny pack, three days after they had to suspend the rescue effort because they didn't have enough people to look for her.
Maureen Kelly of Vancouver, Wash., has not been seen since she left Canyon Creek Campground at Gifford Pinchot National Forest in southwest Washington on Sunday evening, according to Skamania County Undersheriff Dave Cox.
Cox said there were "very limited resources during the week" to continue to search for Kelly. While organized search efforts were suspended on Wednesday, approximately 50 state-certified searchers have made themselves available for an all day search effort today, he said.
"It should be a good day to go find her," Cox told ABCNews.com today. "Right now we're hoping she wants to be found."
Cox said friends of Kelly's who were with her at the campsite expected her to return within a few hours. While she did not indicate when she would return, her friends called the sheriff's office just after midnight Monday morning to report her missing.
"She had talked about doing this spiritual quest for evidently quite some time," he said. "The folks that she was with, they felt that this was something she needed to do."
Cox said it is believed Kelly only had a knife, a compass and matches with her in the fanny pack.
Weather in the forest has been on the cooler side since Kelly went missing, Cox said. The region has received a good amount of rain and temperatures have dropped as low as the mid-40s at night.
In addition to hypothermia, Cox said there are a number of hazardous conditions that could endanger Kelly's life.
"There's always a risk of injury in the territory she's in -- it's very deep and rugged," he said. "There's a lot of debris on the forest floor, so she could slip on moss, or break a leg. There are a lot of different scenarios you could run into."
The sheriff's office does not have photos of Kelly for identification purposes, but authorities are aware of Kelly's physical characteristics.
"There aren't too many folks we know of that are missing here without clothes on," Cox said.
Kelly's family declined to comment to ABC News.
ABC News' Alyssa Newcomb contributed to this report.
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