The phrase "went missing"

Is anyone else struck by the phrase "went missing"? as in this sentence from Colby Cosh:

"About a week ago, I mentioned the discovery of the body of Islanders prospect Duncan MacPherson, who went missing from a ski trip in Austria in 1989." (emphasis added & no special significance to the sentence btw-- DS)

Went missing doesn't sound correct, though it is so commonly used now that it probably has become part of the idiom and is thus "correct."

People use "went missing" to mean "disappear." I think that it is fairly new usage. Or perhaps its a Britishism with which I am unfamiliar. It has a charming sound to it (so it must be a Britishism) but there is also something fundamentally not right about it and I am not enough of (or at all) a grammarian to be able to point it out. Maybe it has something to do with who is acting...or something to do with transitive and intransitive verbs? (I never got that concept.) Or is it using an adjective as an adverb? Duh. Way over my head.

"Missing" is not a place to which one can go. It is the absence of existence, of a place.

Or am I all wrong and is "went missing" perfectly correct? Is it a new usage which subtly attempts to deny the finality of "disappearance" by suggesting that "missing" is a state of being? Just a state beyone our ken?

Comments

[Ellie]

Went missing doesn't sound correct to me and why has it become so popular in the last couple of years.

[Steve McClung]

Yes, I am maddeningly familiar with it...the word "dissappeared" has virtually disappeared from the English language! I'm much madder than hell about this travesty & i hope you are, too!
I'm not sure, but I think Dan Rather is responsible. Among his many weirdnesses was his frequent flagrant flaunting of idiotic Texas phrases such as "He was on that like a hen on a june bug," delivered with a very spooky grin. I'm almost sure his mind & soul went missing in Dallas on 11/22/63 when he propogated the patsy idea & secured his place in the maw of media. I guess they didn't kill him cause they needed a demented stooge to pander for them. Anyway...I digress...
Unbelievably, this thing spread like cudzu throughout TVland until I actually heard Peter Jennings use it on air! He died shortly thereafter, of course.
This phrase, which shall not be used, even in print, by us is an abomination. I just read a book published in 1991 that used it, so it's been around for a while. Things have gotten unacceptably out of hand in the last 4 or 5 years. The most bizarre variation I've heard is, get this, "They searched his house for the hidden money, but it turned up missing!"
Something must -- WILL -- be done, and time IS of the essence. Thank god I am not alone!!
More later
DoNoHarm

[Joanne Berry]

I cringe every time I read "went missing". How in the world does someone "go missing"? Someone PLEASE get the word out to the media that this phrase makes the writer or speaker sound extremely ignorant!

[CLO]

that phrase drives me crazy!!!!!!!!!!!!!