Kayaker's Body Found in Gulf of California; Her Husband, Who Rescued Their Daughter, Is Still Missing at Sea

Abigail Adams
·2 min read
Corey Allen and Yeon-Su Kim, Body of Sea Kayaker Found in Gulf of California; Her Husband, Who Rescued Their Daughter, Still Missing at Sea
Corey Allen and Yeon-Su Kim, Body of Sea Kayaker Found in Gulf of California; Her Husband, Who Rescued Their Daughter, Still Missing at Sea

GoFundMe

A woman has died and her husband remains missing after a sea kayaking trip went terribly wrong in the Gulf of California on Thanksgiving Day.

Yeon-Su Kim and her husband Corey Allen were visiting Mexico with their teenage daughter when they ran into trouble while sea kayaking Thursday afternoon, family friend Lisa Aumack told The Washington Post.

On Sunday, Mexican authorities said one of the bodies had been recovered, but did not identify the victim.

Northern Arizona University, where Kim was employed as a professor, confirmed the educator's death in a statement shared Sunday, obtained by PEOPLE.

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"Yeon-Su was an invaluable faculty member," said president José Luis Cruz Rivera. "Her accomplishments and contributions to her academic discipline, our university's mission, and the broader community were many."

The Kim and Allen families also confirmed Yeon-Su's death in a statement shared via GoFundMe on Sunday. They said the woman's body was found by "a local fishing boat" near Puerto Peñasco.

"Today was an incredibly sad day," the family said in an update to the original post, adding, "We are keeping up the search for Corey, remaining hopeful that we might find him."

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The family of three had ventured out to sea around 1 p.m. on Thursday when "very strong winds came up," making it difficult to continue, according to a GoFundMe campaign organized by Aumack.

Allen managed to bring their daughter Lux back to shore safely before returning to the water to help his wife, the GoFundMe said.

A "full-scale search" was launched later that afternoon, with volunteers scouring the land, sea, and air for the missing couple. The first body was found about three days after the search began.

Aumack told the Post that the couple's daughter is still in Rocky Point, which the Mexican resort city is also called.

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"This is a family that is well known, much loved and respected in Flagstaff," Aumack told the Post. "It is a loss to the entire community."

The Kim and Allen families thanked their supporters in Sunday's GoFundMe update, writing, "Thank you so many times over for your generosity and support through this extremely difficult time for our family."

Funds donated to the GoFundMe campaign will initially go toward reimbursing out-of-pocket expenses for volunteers helping with the search. Any unused funds will go into an account set up to support the couple's children.

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