06-08-2025
Norweigan officials search for Wisconsin journalist Alec Luhn, last seen headed for a hike
Officials are searching for a 38-year-old Wisconsin journalist, last seen by his wife as he set off alone on a hike in a national park in Norway.
Alec Luhn was last seen the afternoon of July 31 as he was headed from Odda, Norway, on a solo backpacking trip to explore the glacier at Folgefonna National Park in southwestern Norway, according to Facebook post from his wife, Veronika Silchenko.
Stormy conditions have made the search efforts more treacherous, according to an X post from the Norweigan Red Cross.
Luhn is from Stoughton in Dane County, according to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he graduated from in 2010. He's an award-winning international freelance reporter, mainly covering the environment since 2022.
Silchenko and Luhn's Milwaukee-based parents couldn't immediately be reached for comment on Aug. 5.
Silchenko told the New York Times that the couple were visiting family in Norway. On July 31, she left to go home to London and Luhn went on his hike. She described her husband as an experienced hiker and it wasn't unusual for him to go on hikes alone. She didn't expect to hear from him because of the spotty phone service in park, the report said. When Luhn missed his return flight home on Aug. 5 she alerted authorities, Silchenko said.
'I just really want him back,' she said. 'I can't sleep or eat properly. It's very hard not to know anything.'
Luhn often travels for work. He's reported from a glacier in Alaska, oilfields in Texas, a drought in Somalia and a research ship on the North Sea. He was a foreign correspondent in Russia for the Guardian, Telegraph and VICE News. When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, he became a full-time climate and science journalist, which was a longtime interest.
In spring 2025, Luhn was a science journalist in residence at the UW School of Journalism and Mass Communication and has plans to work on a project at the university in 2026, according to Kathleen Culver, director of the journalism school.
Luhn was on campus for a week in April and does remote work from the U.K., Culver said, adding she's known Luhn since he was a student on campus.
"I'm really worried," Culver said. "He was heading out back to the U.K. and he said, 'I knew I would love working with students, but I didn't know I would love it this much.'" Luhn wants to do more mentoring of students next year and Culver is working on him returning to a role at the school, she said.
"I am very much looking forward to this being a survival story," Culver said. "And him having lots of things to tell students as he mentors them."
This story was updated because an earlier version included an inaccuracy.
