Why Converging Hearts Exists

A Different Kind of Missing Person Project

When a loved one goes missing, families are often left with more questions than answers. Days become weeks. Weeks become months. Months become years.

For many families, one of the most difficult emotions is loneliness. Not simply the loneliness of missing someone they love, but the feeling that nobody truly understands what happened.

Every disappearance has its own story. Every family carries its own unanswered questions. Every case leaves behind a unique kind of grief.

Converging Hearts was created to help families discover that they may not be alone in those experiences.

The Idea Behind Converging Hearts

Across the United States, thousands of missing person cases have been documented through public databases such as NamUs.

While every case is unique, many disappearances share remarkably similar circumstances.

Some individuals disappeared after abandoning a vehicle. Some vanished while hiking alone. Some walked away from home and never returned. Some disappeared during a mental health crisis. Others were last seen near bodies of water or remote wilderness areas.

These similarities are often difficult to see because cases are separated by geography, time, and jurisdiction.

Converging Hearts uses machine learning and natural language processing to identify missing person cases whose circumstances of disappearance are semantically similar.

Why Similarity Matters

There is a difference between grieving with someone who has experienced loss and grieving with someone whose loved one disappeared in a remarkably similar way.

Families often find themselves trying to explain highly specific circumstances that most people have never experienced.

A family whose loved one disappeared after abandoning a vehicle may feel understood by another family facing the same questions.

A family whose loved one vanished while camping or hiking may connect with another family navigating that same uncertainty.

A family dealing with a disappearance during a mental health crisis may find comfort speaking with others who understand those circumstances.

Shared circumstances do not create answers. But they can create understanding. And understanding can create connection.

What This Project Is Not

Converging Hearts is not intended to replace law enforcement, investigators, search organizations, or the NamUs system.

This website does not determine what happened to any missing person. It does not draw conclusions. It does not identify suspects. It does not establish facts.

The similarity results displayed throughout this website are generated using machine learning models that analyze publicly available case descriptions and identify cases that share similar language and circumstances.

The Mission

The mission of Converging Hearts is simple:

Behind every case number is a person.

Behind every person is a family.

And behind every family is a story that deserves to be remembered.

Converging Hearts exists to help those stories find one another.