{"id":1938,"date":"2026-06-08T08:03:47","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T08:03:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southfloridamovingguides.com\/?p=1938"},"modified":"2026-06-08T08:03:47","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T08:03:47","slug":"alabama-student-vanishes-while-traveling-with-family-in-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southfloridamovingguides.com\/?p=1938","title":{"rendered":"Alabama student vanishes while traveling with family in Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"
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KYOTO, Japan \u2014 There was an ongoing search on Thursday for a 20-year-old college student from Alabama, who vanished on May 29 while traveling with his family in Japan. <\/p>\n

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Leer en espa\u00f1ol<\/p>\n

James \u201cWeston\u201d Higginbotham, a junior at Auburn University who was studying environmental engineering, didn\u2019t return to the hotel where he was staying in Kyoto. <\/p>\n

Surveillance video showed him at a train station in Yamashina, the eastern gateway to Kyoto, according to his mother\u2019s regular Facebook posts. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not unusual for Weston to blow off steam, going to the woods, and just exploring. That\u2019s his happy place. I\u2019m thinking \u2026 he\u2019s just off in the woods, and he got lost,\u201d his mother, Nancy Higginbotham, told CNN. <\/p>\n

A typhoon impacted the area on June 2. The FBI, the Kyoto Prefectural Police, and volunteers were involved in the massive search, which also included K-9 dogs and helicopters. <\/p>\n

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At Asbury United Methodist Church in Birmingham, Robert Holt, the student\u2019s grandfather, told WVTM-TV on Thursday that the Spain Park High School graduate had recently completed an Ironman triathlon. <\/p>\n

\u201cWeston\u201d was last seen wearing a white \u201cSave the Bees\u201d T-shirt with two bumblebees, light lavender corduroy pants, and black-and-white Adidas sneakers. <\/p>\n

The area where we believe Weston is missing has ample water and limited berries. There is still hope. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe police will reconvene tomorrow to come up with another plan to include watching additional CCTV footage to follow up on another lead. They are also deploying a smaller team to the forest,\u201d his mother wrote on Thursday on Facebook. <\/p>\n

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