Looks like the bar is in town. Some how she managed to walk in to the woods from an in town bar in frigid weather.
She was a pretty little thing. I am a bit suspicious.
Posted on 01/26/2026 9:22:20 AM PST by BenLurkin
A missing Kansas elementary school teacher was discovered dead in the snow just 300 yards from where surveillance footage last captured her Friday as a massive winter storm swept the country.
The body of 28-year-old Rebecca Rauber was found covered in snow in a wooded area of Emporia on Sunday, near where she was last seen leaving a bar days earlier, police told KWCH.
Police said Rauber was located by K-9 Daisy of K-9 Search and Rescue Kansas.
Rauber, a second-grade teacher at Riverside Elementary School, is believed to have died from hypothermia just hours after she disappeared.
Police said the family of the young teacher has been notified and that an autopsy is pending to determine her cause of death.
Rauber was reported missing early Saturday after leaving the Town Royal bar on foot without her purse, phone or a jacket.
She was last seen on surveillance footage leaving the bar during the ferocious winter storm around 11:37 p.m.
Temperatures were around 3 degrees, with a wind chill of minus 13, when she is believed to have left the bar.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I was at a neighborhood party Saturday afternoon and probably had around 8-10 shots worth of Monkey Shoulder bourbon, over 2 hours or so, along with food. I did not feel drunk at all - until I walked home and felt euphoric and happy. The wind chill was -12 or so, but I could not feel it. I wore my coat and gloves and carried a plate of BBQ home for my wife. But if I had forgotten the coat, I wonder if I could have gotten disoriented. And Kansas winters are a totally different animal than the N.E.
[Her drink was spiked.]
Or she took an anxiety pill before having drinks. Ex-wife made that mistake a couple times. Turned her into an uncontrollable,impulsive, illogical phyco. Ended up having to bail her out of jail once (still question that decision). All her own doing.
“wind chill was -12 or so, but I could not feel it”
Good point about not feeling it. Glad you made it home safe.
“My first duty station in the Army was Ft. Riley, KS and it quickly disabused me of the notion that I knew what cold was. The wind chills of a Kansas winter are utterly brutal.” You’re not kidding, about 10 here now, but thankfully no wind. I don’t know what the girl thought she was trying to do.
Nothing good happens after 11 pm in 3-degree weather.
Looks like the bar is in town. Some how she managed to walk in to the woods from an in town bar in frigid weather.
She was a pretty little thing. I am a bit suspicious.
Unless schools were already announced closed. On Friday, our schools early-announced schools would be closed Monday due to the storm. Our church did the same.
Some bars have side exit doors that lock, preventing side-door reentry. Go out to smoke, get locked out and lose your way looking for the front door and end up in the woods. With a cold enough wind chill and no coat, one can become disoriented in a couple of minutes, especially if the conditions were “white out.”
Could be. I just despair of the many reports of carelessly dangerous or immoral behavior by teachers.
Or, you might not judge others.
Can you even get Ouzo in a bar?
Dang. I’m not one to judge a drunkard, as I am a drunkard. But I have never gotten so drunk that the bartender didn’t check me and call a cab. Poor girl. dive bars have a crew of drunks who, as weird as it sounds, look out for each other.
I am a professional drunk on the wagon so I know all the ins and outs of drinking culture.
My blood is of eastern Europe and Scotland. During winter when we would get hammered we would bring the family cow. When it was time to go home the mates would just tie our arm to the cow and she would walk us home. And when it was so cold we would end up cuddling with the cow and stay warm.
We slavs knew how to get proper drunk.
Never got that cold on my scottish side...,
Don’t call Uber, follow the cow!
Especially at night, I would think.
where she was last seen leaving a bar days earlier,
Maybe she should have called an Uber? Don’t walk drunk and die.
Whether she was completely drunk and/or drugged the fact is she was clearly not in any state of mind to make any rational decisions. Likely the bar wasn’t baby sitting her. Really sad.
People in the FL Keys have hurricane parties. I lived in FL and been down to Key West. The thought of anything greater than a heavy thunderstorm there gave me the willies.
This story misses multiple bits of expanatory details which I will not harp on. The root of it is as you pointed out.
Common sense in avoiding risky situations prevents a person from making stupid decisions in the heat (or cold) of the moment. If you're not there, you can't do anything fatally stupid. Or have it done to you.
Sad for her family. Real life: people die all the time as the result of poorly thought out behavior.
“”She had to be hammered, left her purse, phone and jacket behind?””
Hard to come up with anything else...at least, she wasn’t driving drunk!
We rarely need them but every few years there are a some days when you open the door and it is like walking into a glass of milk.
On those days you do not go out without telling someone where you are going and when you get there giving the three tug signal.
Overkill maybe, but we have not lost anyone yet. :)
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