Shannon Leah Fraser emerged from a rainforest in Australian on Wednesday after 17 days lost in the jungle, dehydrated and 37 pounds lighter.
Fraser, 30, went into the forest with a partner to visit the Golden Hole swimming spot northwest of Innisfail in Queensland,
according to Australian Broadcasting Corporation News. The couple got separated during a walk and she became lost.
"She was that exhausted, she couldn't walk, she just felt like giving up," Dylan Fraser, Shannon Fraser's brother, told ABC News. "She just stayed strong, and made it out."
A banana farmer at Golden Hole spotted Shannon Fraser when she came out of the rainforest and transported her to Innisfail Hospital where doctors listed her in stable condition.
"It's just overwhelming, everyone has just been so upset," Dylan Fraser told ABC News. "We're over the moon to have her back. We were just trying to stay positive and trying not to think the worst."
Far North Inspector Rhys Newton told the
Courier-Mail that search parties spent some 800 hours looking for the mother of three children in the area over the past 17 days and had all but given up trying to find her.
Newton told the Courier-Mail he believed the crew did a comprehensive search of the area and does not know how she remained missing for so long. She emerged from the forest 30 meters from the area she was last seen, according to the newspaper.
"I have every confidence in the search coordinators and I'm convinced that there was an extremely high probability of locating that missing person had she been in that area we were searching," Newton said.
"The effort of those searchers, particularly the SES volunteers, is extraordinary in the circumstances. Her movements have gone out of what we could reasonably expect a person who is lost in those circumstances," he continued.
Related Stories:
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.