“They usually find something…” Lily Hooper’s father choked out the words as his 18-year-old daughter remained missing without a trace following a solo trip. Despite search efforts, every sign of her seemed to have been wiped clean from the wilderness. He could only return to the last place she was seen and repeat the same phrase: “We have to find her.” The full story of what happened to her is revealed.
**“They usually find something…”**
Lily Hooper’s father choked out the words as his 18-year-old daughter remained missing without a trace following a solo hike. Despite days of intensive search efforts, every sign of her seemed to have been wiped clean from the wilderness. He could only return to the last place she was seen and repeat the same phrase: “We have to find her.”
The full story of what happened to Lily Hooper is now known in its tragic outline, even if many of the precise details remain under investigation.
On the morning of Wednesday, 12 August 2026, Lily left the family home on Burragorang Road in Oakdale, in Sydney’s southwest. She told her family she was going for a hike in Nattai National Park in the NSW Southern Highlands. She was 18, fit, an experienced bushwalker, and someone who trained regularly in Muay Thai, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and mixed martial arts. Those who knew her described her as tough.
She is believed to have reached the summit of Bonnum Pic mid-morning and to have sent messages to loved ones from the trail. By 10pm that night she had not returned home. The family raised the alarm. Around 11pm her car was found parked on Wanganderry Road near the start of the Bonnum Pic Walking Trail. The vehicle was still there. Lily was not.
What followed was a massive multi-agency search. Specialist police, SES volunteers, the Rural Fire Service, Volunteer Rescue Association, PolAir, the police dog unit and, later, more than 100 Australian Defence Force personnel joined the effort. Helicopters with thermal imaging flew overhead. Ground teams pushed through steep drops, deep ravines, creek lines, cliff sides and dense post-fire regrowth that made the trail overgrown and difficult to follow. Poor weather over the weekend further complicated the already arduous conditions.
By Monday, 17 August, with the search well into its fifth day and no trace of Lily or any of her belongings found, her father Jim Hooper made an emotional call to Sydney radio station 2SM. Speaking through tears to host Tim Webster, he said he was putting his boots on and heading straight back into the bush.
“We’re going to find her today. I’m going back there now. I’m just putting my boots on,” he said.
“I just want everyone to throw love and energy because we’ve got to go and find her. We’ve got to find this kid. She’s got to be in there somewhere.”
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He urged the community to cross their fingers. Then came the lines that would be repeated across news outlets:
“It’s like she’s just … vanished off the planet. I don’t know. I just can’t make it out. Normally they’d find something — I don’t want to think of the worst. She’s a tough kid, she’s a tough girl.”
Those words captured the growing bewilderment of a father who could not understand how an experienced, fit young woman could leave so little evidence of her presence in the landscape. Search commanders confirmed the same frustration. Chief Inspector Brendan Bernie told media that no items belonging to Lily had been located. Police stressed they were treating the matter as a search-and-rescue operation, that there was no evidence of foul play, and that speculation about criminal involvement caused undue distress to the family. They said they were relying on Lily’s experience and fitness to help her survive.
Jim Hooper returned to the search area day after day. The family remained stationed at the command post. On Tuesday they released a formal statement describing themselves as “absolutely devastated” and pleading for their daughter to be brought home safe. They thanked the emergency services and volunteers working around the clock and asked the public to respect the professional search effort given the dangerous terrain.
The search continued. The area of focus narrowed to sections of the Bonnum Pic trail and surrounding bushland. Still nothing was found. The sense that Lily had simply disappeared intensified.
Then, on the morning of Thursday, 20 August — eight days after she was last seen — SES volunteers located a body in thick, dense bushland. The site was a significant distance from the marked walking trail and from the place where her car had stood since the night of 12 August. The discovery was made at approximately 11.30am.
An initial radio report from the scene indicated that the teenager had been found alive. That information was passed to the command post and then to Lily’s parents. For a short period — police estimate between eight and ten minutes — the family believed their daughter was alive. After more than a week of not knowing, they experienced a sudden surge of hope. Preparations for a reunion began in those minutes.
The hope did not last. A corrected report reached the command post. The more accurate account confirmed that the young woman was deceased. Police believe the body is Lily’s, though formal identification is still pending. Recovery from the remote and difficult terrain is expected to take many hours and will likely require carrying the remains out on foot.
NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon later apologised without reservation for the communications error. “I unashamedly apologise for any additional trauma that may have caused Lily’s family,” he said. He described the mistake as “born out of elation” after searchers finally located the missing teenager, combined with the practical difficulties of handheld radio contact in an area with poor reception. Assistant Commissioner Joe Cassar confirmed there is “no playbook to communication” in such conditions and said the family was given the initial positive report before the accurate information arrived. Both officers rejected any suggestion that police had “jumped the gun.” The communications issue will form part of the brief of evidence for the coroner.
The Premier, Chris Minns, was also given the incorrect information. During a budget estimates hearing he announced that Lily had been found alive “in the bush with half a bottle of water with her,” calling it fantastic news. Shortly afterwards he returned with the corrected information, visibly distressed, and apologised. In a later statement he said he had genuinely believed he was sharing good news and expressed deep regret if his words had added to the family’s pain.
Police have stated they currently do not suspect foul play. Criminal investigators from the Hume Police District are involved as standard protocol in any unexplained death. A full coronial investigation will examine the time, place and circumstances of Lily’s death. It remains too early, authorities say, to determine the cause of death or whether injuries were sustained. The priority has shifted to the respectful recovery of her remains and their return to her family.
Jim Hooper’s words from the middle of the search now land with devastating force. The father who could not understand how his tough, experienced daughter had left no trace, who kept returning to the bush and insisting “we have to find her,” ultimately received the outcome he had tried not to think about. The wilderness that had seemed to wipe every sign of her clean eventually yielded her body, far from the trail and far from the car that had waited at the trailhead for eight days.
Lily Hooper was 18 years old. She set out alone on a trail she knew. She messaged from the summit. She did not come home. Her car remained where she left it. Searchers found nothing belonging to her for more than a week. Her father stood in the middle of that silence and said it was as if she had vanished off the planet. Then, on the eighth day, she was found — first, for a few cruel minutes, reported as alive, and then confirmed as deceased.
The coronial process will take time. Many questions about the final hours or days of her life may never be answered with complete certainty. What is already clear is the human cost: a family that waited, hoped, briefly believed, and then lost; a father whose public vow of determination was answered only with the most painful possible confirmation; and a young woman whose disappearance left almost no trace until the search finally ended in the dense bushland of Nattai National Park.
“They usually find something,” Jim Hooper had said when the silence felt absolute. In the end they did. It was not the something any parent would ever want to find.
