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The remains of a missing man from Florida were found in a lake almost 20 years after he disappeared completely.
The mystery was finally solved when a submerged car was discovered using the power of technology – Google Maps.
The disappearance of 40-year-old William Moldt had been investigated since November, 8, 1997, but police were left without any more leads.
But the case took a turn after someone spotted a submerged vehicle in a pond on Google Maps and called cops about what they saw.
Although Moldt's remains were found in 2019, recent reports claim the satellite images of the vehicle had been available on Google Earth since 2007, but no one had stumbled across it until then.
The man who spotted the car was the manager of The Grand Isles housing development.
At the time of the missing person's report, the area was just a building site, but since then the development had grown.
When police were called out to the water, in Wellington, near Palm Beach, they determined the car had likely been submerged for some time due to the condition it was in.
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After the vehicle was removed from the pond, the remains were discovered inside, with a medical examiner confirming Moldt's identity.
The Charley Project, an online database collecting information on US cold cases, says it's possible the car was visible on Google Maps for more than 10 years.
It writes: "Amazingly, the vehicle had been plainly visible on a Google Earth satellite image of the area since 2007, but apparently no one had noticed it until 2019 when a property surveyor saw the car while looking at Google Earth."
Moldt had left a nightclub on the evening he was last sighted, a report from The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System states.
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He called his girlfriend around 9.30pm to tell her he was on his way home but tragically he never made it.
The report adds he was a quiet man who wasn't a frequent drinker but "did have several drinks at the bar."
However, on the night he went missing, he didn't appear intoxicated and left the club alone.
It's believed Moldt lost control of the car and ended up driving into the water.
Police spokeswoman Therese Barbera said at the time: "You can't determine what happened that many years ago, what transpired.
"All we know is that he went missing off the face of the Earth, and now he's been discovered."
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- Google Earth
- Google Maps
- Missing Person
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