# search call.



## Nancy Jocoy (Apr 19, 2006)

It was ultimately a DNR agent in a kayak who made the find but it was truly a combined multi-agency search.

Much of the contamination was familial- and this time we had a somewhat contaminated scent article but over all. There are two stories there. One Toddler Found and one Lessons Learned where he talks about the search dogs.

http://www2.wspa.com/news/2011/dec/...vi-113661/&cb=2&shorturl=http://bit.ly/rMryaw


My part was an early negative scan with Grim of a nearby pond and mapping for the rest.


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## Jim Delbridge (Jan 27, 2010)

Glad he was found alive. 1-2 y/o's end up in the oddest places.

Jim


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## Jennifer Michelson (Sep 20, 2006)

nice job. Really glad the baby was found alive!


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## Chris McDonald (May 29, 2008)

Any idea what they mean by this

"They used search dogs to track the scent of the child but lost it Friday night because of weather."

Just wondering


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## Don Turnipseed (Oct 8, 2006)

Chris McDonald said:


> Any idea what they mean by this
> 
> "They used search dogs to track the scent of the child but lost it Friday night because of weather."
> 
> ...


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## Nancy Jocoy (Apr 19, 2006)

You got me on the weather comment. Weather was fine it rained a little and was cool but not cold. Not enough rain to be a problem.

Well, anytime you get something on the news....you get some interesting remarks....Had not read down that far.

I was just happy the SO reported they need to do more to educate the public more about everyone NOT coming and tromping through the woods and getting hurt and messing up clues as well as expressing his feelings on using the dogs. It is a real problem when small kids get lost. Nobody cares when someone walks away from a nursing home.

The child was small at 20lbs and I don't think anyone got a good clear track..just bits and peices and some going in different directions. Was not involved in the trailing efforts other than mapping their results so I really can't comment on that. I just ran my cadaver dog by a pond behind the house and drew a negative.

Kid was pretty far from house, our air scent dogs needed a break from searching closer to the point last seen and more resources were enroute when he was found.


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## mel boschwitz (Apr 23, 2010)

Kids do the darndest things huh? 

What lessons will your SAR team take away from this? Will you try to mimic the scenario to some extent with family/ fresh scent, etc.. to see if you can train your dogs past it better? Or was it such an extreme circumstance that you dont expect the conditions to be mimicked as such again? Can you use that scenario to educate the community more? 

Were you confident with Grimms responses that the child was not in the area you searched? Or did family scent interfere with your searching as well??( since he's cadaver I imagine not but I dont train cadaver so what do I know? Lol).

Just curious as to what your team will do with "lessons learned".


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## Nancy Jocoy (Apr 19, 2006)

First off I don't think this is a comedy of errors; the search was well run and normally lost children are found in our county in a matter of a few hours. 

Sometimes you get one for the books though.The IC did a good job of coordinating a multi-agency response and the child was found alive. 

One lesson we have learned from searches in the past is that searching in the vicinity of someone's home can be much more difficult than elsewhere - makes logical sense. There are going to be trails everywhere and the family will have contaminated the search area. We have been setting up more training scenarios just like this.

That is a question I want to know from the trailing folks is if you have a trail behind the house in the shady moist woods that is older but probably stronger than the one that crossed the paved street and went across a dirt parking lot down a dirt road and in a dry a field in the middle of the day. I can see where that could be tough and maybe a good test scenario--the dogs should be able to age the scent and pick the older, albiet weaker trail...but that is the next scenario I am going to suggest.

[[do understand when I pose that question I do NOT work a trailing dog; I have done some trailing to the point of initial certification, but just a curious question]]

We have also seen police bloodhounds have the same issues in this situation even though everyone knows you don't cast the dog right outside the house but get out a ways.

But, like other searches, we always have a team meeting afterwards to discuss lessons learned and what we did right, what we did wrong and will for this one as well. 

Grim is a single purpose cadaver dog - all he cares about is the odor of human remains. Even if he had had a response we would have continued searching for a live person until a body was located. You don't want to give up hope someone is alive based on an unconfirmed indication from a cadaver dog-

EDIT-It would be a good project to come up with a community education piece on missing kids though.


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