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HURON TOWNSHIP, Mich. — As of Wednesday, May 13, 2026, the search for a missing Southgate woman was still centered on a quiet residential area near Pennsylvania and Hannan Roads, where her car was found wrecked in a backyard days earlier. With forecasters predicting a turn for the worse, Huron Township police say they are fighting the clock to get answers before weather complicates the effort.
The missing woman is Kimberly Noel McGrath, 43, known to her family as “Kimmy.” Investigators believe her car was involved in a crash Friday, though it was not found until Saturday when a neighbor was mowing a lawn in the area. The vehicle was located in the backyard of a home owned by Peter J. Glaab Jr., and it was immediately clear that this was not an ordinary fender-bender.
Police said the car was heavily damaged in the front and could not be driven. More striking, the engine was still running when it was discovered, and McGrath’s cell phone and purse were still inside. There was no sign of McGrath, and police have not found a witness or surveillance video capturing the crash or any movement afterward.
Huron Township Police Chief Everette Robins, who also serves as director of public safety, said the scene raises far more questions than answers.
“The concerning part is all of her personal belongings were inside including her cell phone, her purse. The car was left running. We have no direction of travel, we have no idea where she went,” Robins said. “None of her family members, that we’re aware of, have heard from her. So we’re very concerned right now.”
Search crews have already covered a wide area using ground teams, boats and aircraft. Robins said additional resources from multiple departments were brought in to help with the effort. Still, none of those searches has produced a credible sighting or any physical trace of McGrath.
One of the most troubling possibilities, Robins said, is that McGrath was injured in the crash and became disoriented. He pointed to the risk of a head injury that could cause someone to leave a running car and walk away without a clear sense of what happened.
“The significant concern is, did she hit her head in the crash? Was there any type of injury that could have put her into some type of episode?” he said.
Glaab, whose home is near the crash site, described the vehicle as smashed in the front and impossible to drive. He also warned that the area is dangerously close to the river. If McGrath had headed straight down after leaving the car, he said, she could have ended up in the water. That possibility has not been ruled out by police, and it explains why some of the search activity has focused on the waterway and its banks.
While the search continues, McGrath’s family is trying to understand how she could vanish so completely. Her cousin, Monica Doyle, said McGrath was delivering food in the area Friday, a job she had started roughly six weeks earlier. Doyle and McGrath’s aunt, Elizabeth Zaenger, described McGrath as doing well before the
