Montana Mystery – What Happened to Patricia Meehan?

Missing person stories have intrigued me since childhood, and especially when they involve my home state of Montana.  There are many that involve our wild expanses of wilderness that we have.  But it isn't just the wilderness that can hide someone.

via GIPHY

Eastern Montana is a wide expanse of open prairie, badlands and coulees that can stretch for miles.  And it holds an almost 40-year mystery that still goes unsolved to this day along a lonely stretch of Highway 200 near a small rural town of just under 600 people.

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Montana Mystery - What Happened to Patricia Meehan?

Nestled in the northeastern part of Montana is the small town of Circle, and on the night of April 20, 1989, a mystery evolved after a tragic accident on Highway 200.  Patricia Meehan was travelling that roadway when her car suddenly veered into the oncoming lane and car, meeting head on.

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According to reports of the accident, Patricia miraculously "crawled out of the wreckage, looked blankly at the driver of the other vehicle, then climbed over a fence near the road and disappeared into the countryside".  Since that time, she has never been heard from again, nearly 37 years.

Some Sightings as Theories Abound About What Happened to Patricia Meehan

The story of Ms. Meehan was such an oddity that it gained national attention, with the television show "Unsolved Mysteries" featuring the missing woman.  Reported sightings were even confirmed by her parents in various states including Montana, Washington, South Dakota and even Minnesota.  Yet she remains missing.

The last person to see Patricia was Peggy Bueller, who was travelling the roadway with her father.  In the interview with Unsolved Mysteries, Bueller said she "looked out across the accident, I noticed someone on the other side of the fence. [She was] standing there like a spectator - not like it had happened to her."

Bueller said she watched the woman, and "as the unidentified woman stood silently for several moments on the opposite side of the fence before walking away into an empty field, vanishing into the night."  The case remains open in McCone County, Montana.