Greggs sausage roll upstages flying spy tech in luring runaway canine out of hiding

Just four days after Athena the dog ran away, local horse riders spotted the pooch at the side of a path, and passers-by were able to lure the pooch in with sausage rolls.

Animal-lovers who launched a four-day, high-tech mission to find a lost dog were upstaged when the runaway pooch was lured out of hiding with a Greggs sausage roll.

The K9 RSQ group swooped into action using drones, camouflaged spy cameras, and on-the-ground teams in an effort to find Romanian rescue Athena, who ran off following a motorway crash.

After four days of searching there was no sign of the lost German Shepherd cross when eagle-eyed walkers lured her out into the open using sausage rolls.

Owner Michelle Storer, 57, was then reunited with her beloved pet. The thankful dog owner said: “I was beside myself. It was really stressful. After Saturday night, I honestly thought I was not going to get her back on Sunday and that she’d probably also been hit but not found. The police said they think they’d have known if she was hit by a car, so I was hopeful from Sunday.”

Just four days after she ran away, local horse riders spotted the pooch at the side of a path, and passers-by were able to lure the pooch in with sausage rolls.

Michelle added: “She was playing with somebody’s dog in the park, and a man and his child had some Greggs sausage rolls which they managed to lure her in with – she was starving by that point.

“We’d just arrived when the man with the sausage roll managed to hook her up onto a lead.

“She was absolutely thrilled to see us, and we brought her home.”

Michelle had been driving on the M1 following a dog walk at Ladybower Reservoir, Derbyshire, when a driver smashed into her on Saturday, March 15.

The NHS worker was completely spun around in the crash to face oncoming traffic and, devastatingly, her car’s boot lid popped open and two of her three dogs escaped.

She said: “Fortunately, there was no hard shoulder, but there was a small pull-in. We managed to get out of the car, otherwise we would have been facing oncoming traffic. Sadly, the boot lid popped open momentarily and two of my three dogs jumped out of the car – so Darcy, the little black and white springer spaniel, and Athena both ran into oncoming traffic.

“Athena stayed in the central reservation, but Darcy was sadly hit by a car and killed there and then on the side of the road.”

Amid the chaos of the crash, other motorists shooed Athena off the carriageway to prevent her from becoming injured, but she ran away into nearby woods.

Following the crash, a 40-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of failing to provide a specimen for analysis and driving without due care and attention.

What followed was an agonising four days where Michelle was unsure if she’d ever see her beloved 18-month-old pooch again.

Michelle contacted dog-finding group K9 RSQ through social media for assistance.

The group used its network of 2,300 online followers as well as experienced drone pilots and dog catchers in an effort to find missing Athena.

Michelle said: “On Sunday, we went on foot and started to look for her in the area near the crash and in the fields and the footpath, speaking to all the local dog walkers.

“We had some potential sightings. Erica and Nathan, from K9 RSQ, came out with their drones and looked. We went over towards junction 33, where there had been another potential sighting. Sadly none of them resulted in us bringing her home on Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday.”

She added: “Erica, the drone pilot, said these dogs are quite streetwise and that she’d probably go underground for four or five days, nobody would see anything of her and all of a sudden she’d be seen everywhere.”

Her predictions came true – on Wednesday morning, Athena was spotted by passing horse riders, who alerted the family to her presence.

Michelle then made the 45-minute drive from her hometown of Newark, Nottinghamshire, back to the Peak District to reunite with her pet.

The grandmother-of-two thanked K9 RSQ for their help with the search and praised the ‘incredible’ team with their ‘super dooper drones’.

The group is now fundraising for a thermal imaging drone to assist in their searches, which they plan to name ‘Darcy’s drone’ in memory of Michelle’s dog, who was killed on the motorway.

K9 RSQ co-ordinator Craig Dent remotely marshalled the group’s search efforts.

He said: “It was a nationwide effort. There were people in Shropshire and the south coast who all joined in the Facebook chat, offering suggestions and advice. We had people studying Google Earth and maps to see where Athena was most likely to go. We are hoping a new thermal drone will help us recover dogs in the future – so any help from the public would be great.”