Yun Jong-su, a South Korean fisherman who was abducted by North Korea in the 1970s and dramatically escaped decades later, died of COVID-19 at a hospital in South Korea at 8:12 a.m. on Monday, NK News has confirmed. He was 78 years old.

Yun’s life intermittently grazed headlines as he fought to find his daughter, who was born in North Korea and reportedly arrested by DPRK authorities during an attempt to escape the country in 2008. Yun perished before ever finding out what happened to her, succumbing to a virus that has claimed more than 1.87 million lives around the world to date.