Woman is found after wandering from home

An 84-year-old woman who had been missing since Wednesday afternoon was found today about two miles from her home, following an aerial and canine search by police and firefighters.

Fortunata Ringor of 1044 Hoihoi Ave. in Whitmore Village was found near a Dole Plantation reservoir by a plantation supervisor at about 2:45 p.m., fire officials said.

Ringor's family feared she would not make it home because she has Alzheimer's and dementia and had wandered from her home before.

"All she said was that she was hungry, which is a good sign. I feel blessed that she's well because we've been praying," said her daughter Priscilla Olszewski.

Relatives do not know her route, but she was found carrying a bag of bananas.

Family members thought Ringor might have gone a block from her house, down a gully into the banana patch that she has tended for years.

"She used to walk there to get bananas," Olszewski said.

Ringor arrived in Hawaii in 1946 and has since lived in Whitmore Village. For 20 years she ran a care home in her house for five people before retiring, her daughter said. She has four children.

Ringor told her family that her husband, who died about a year ago, was walking with her.

"She said he was with her, spiritually," Olszewski said. "We're all happy now."