Stunning break in the case of Long Island man who vanished 15 years ago after divers find submerged car

The mystery of a Long Island man who vanished 15 years ago was officially closed this week when authorities confirmed his remains were found in a submerged car off Cedar Beach.

Police confirmed Tuesday that the barnacle-covered Chrysler PT Cruiser found last month by divers in Mt. Sinai belonged to Robert Long, who went missing in December 2010 at the age of 62 while on a run to a local liquor store in the same vehicle.

Dan Pritchard and his diving partner Bill McIntosh — who travel the world looking for missing people — recently set out to find Long in June with the nonprofit, Exploring with a Mission.

The pair used kayaks equipped with special side-scan sonar devices that helped look underwater, with McIntosh revealing they had four locations to check and Cedar Beach just happened to be first on the list.

After several hours searching in the water on day one, the divers found what are now confirmed to be Long’s skeletal remains in the car — immediately calling police, who conducted their own diving search. Authorities later lifted the vehicle out of the water with a crane after confirming the human remains, according to police.

“I reached in and grabbed a handful of bones, and brought one up to the surface,” Pritchard said at the time. 

At the time of his disappearance, Long’s wife Joanne said that her husband had ventured to a local wine shop on Route 25A, and never returned home. Employees of the shop recalled Long entering the store and making a purchase the day he went missing, but “didn’t notice anything out of character,” according to a Newsday report from 2010.

Joanne revealed at the time that her husband had previously spoke of committing suicide. 

“This is totally out of character for him,” she told the outlet over a decade ago. “When he did drink, he would get a bottle and come home… He was wearing his house slippers and had no money, and only the clothes on his back.”

After discovering the remains inside the matching car, Pritchard and McIntosh said they consoled Joanne.

“It’s obviously a great relief when you identify the vehicle that you’re looking for,” Pritchard told local radio station 1010 WINS. “It is satisfying to know that we can give — as hard as the answers are — to the family.”

McIntosh added to that sentiment, and said “when you find a person, you bring them home and you’re able to close a chapter in another person’s life, a family’s life — we give them hope.”

Both divers plan on spending the next few months scouring waterways up and down the East Coast in search of sunken vehicles — including several on Long Island. They believe the search could recover the remains of up to 50 missing people.