Even literary critics can be very clumsy writers. “After the writer’s sudden disappearance in August of 2015. . .” writes one critic. In reality, the writer didn’t suddenly disappear. He died of lung cancer. People who don’t know what happened to the writer might conclude he was kidnapped or went missing.
We all need to be very careful with our writing. And I say it as somebody who is still wriggling with shame after writing, “Since Franco’s downfall, Spain has established a working democracy.” As my thesis advisor pointed out when she read this atrocious sentence, “What downfall? He died.”
Clarissa's Blog 
Since Franco went into an extended illness and coma, he lost power functionally long before he died. In that context, your phrasing might be awkward but is more accurate than the teacher’s saying that he simply died. (His coma became a running gagline on SNL during that time, going from something like “General Franco is still not dead yet” to “General Franco is still dead.”)
This writer, is saying that a person has suddenly disappeared, sounds too lazy to have googled the person to see what happened. It’s one thing to use poor word construction, another to fail to get simple facts straight.
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Thank you, I feel less embarrassed now!
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