Savannah Guthrie Recalls the Moment She Learned Mom Nancy Guthrie Was Missing: ‘In a Panic’

Savannah Guthrie is taking TODAY viewers back to the moment she learned that her 84-year-old mother was missing.

Savannah sat down with Hoda Kotb for her emotional first interview since Nancy was reported missing on Feb. 1, recalling the moment she received a call from her sister, Annie Guthrie, breaking the news.

“I said, ‘Is everything OK?’ And she said, ‘No.’ She said, ‘Mom’s missing,’” Savannah remembered. “And I said, ‘What? What are you talking about?’ She said, ‘She’s gone.’ And she was in a panic. I was in a panic.’”

“We thought that she must have had some kind of medical episode in the night, and that somehow the paramedics had come because the back doors were propped open, and that didn’t make any sense,” Savannah said. “We thought maybe they came, and there was a stretcher, and they took her out the back. But her phone was there, and her purse was there, and all her things. And it just didn’t make any sense.”

Having already called the police, Savannah and her family began calling local hospitals to see if Nancy had been admitted, “and it was just chaos and disbelief.”

Savannah immediately traveled to Tucson, Ariz., to be with her family, where she and her siblings insisted to Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos that Nancy’s disappearance was not a case of someone with dementia wandering off.

“My mom, she was in tremendous pain,” Savannah explained. “Her back was very bad. On a good day, she could walk down to the mailbox and get the mail, but most days not. So there wasn’t a wander off. And the doors were propped open, and there was blood on the front doorstep. And the Ring camera had been yanked off. And so we were saying, ‘This, this is not OK. Something is very wrong here.’”

Nancy was reported missing on Feb. 1 after being seen by her family the night before. Police and the FBI have been investigating the identity of a masked and armed man who appeared on Nancy’s doorbell camera prior to her abduction.

The Guthrie family is offering a $1 million reward for Nancy’s return, and the FBI is offering an additional $100,000 reward. People who have information about Nancy’s abduction or whereabouts are asked to call 1-800-CALL-FBI.

The rest of Savannah’s interview will air on Friday.