Pollen testing reveals new information about unidentified woman found off Vancouver beach

A kayaker who died hours after being rescued four years ago has never been identified.

Nearly four years after a woman was found clinging to life near a Vancouver beach, forensic testing of pollen on her clothes has revealed new information about where she could have spent her final days.

A tugboat crew discovered the woman floating in the water off Spanish Banks on the night of Sept. 29, 2022, according to the Vancouver Police Department. Emergency crews were able to resuscitate her, but she died in hospital soon after.

She was found near an inflatable kayak and had candy, insulin and a backpack with her, but no identification.

To this day the woman has not been identified, and no missing persons reports were ever linked to her despite searches of files across North America and through Interpol, police said. Her fingerprints also had no match in Canadian and U.S. databases.

“Investigators believe she may never have been reported missing, yet remain confident that someone, somewhere, is looking for her,” the VPD wrote in a news release Monday.

There has now been a breakthrough in the case after the VPD sent the woman’s backpack and sweater for testing at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Laboratory in Chicago, where the pollen grains and fern spores on the belongings could be analyzed.

Police say a July 2025 report from the lab suggests the sweater was recently exposed to an urban environment in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, “plausibly Seattle or Portland.”

The department added there was a “near total absence” of pollen grains or fern spores from the Vancouver area—indicating the woman is not from here and may have been in Seattle or Portland before she died.

Investigators with the VPD will be travelling to Seattle and will hold a news conference in hopes of triggering memories or finding new leads in the U.S.

“Every time I go through there, it’s still a sad feeling,” said Jonas Grey, the captain of the tugboat the found the woman, in a new video about the case produced by the VPD. “I wonder what happened to the poor girl in that instance, and her poor family, you know.”

Anyone with information is asked to email [e-mail] or call call 604-717-0619.