KENNEBUNKPORT, Maine — A Maine game warden and his warden K9 found and rescued a missing Kennebunkport woman Wednesday night who became disoriented and lost behind her home in the woods.
Around 7 p.m. Wednesday, Helen Baillie, 65, reportedly took her black lab for a walk in the woods behind her Kennebunkport home on Arundel Road, a news release from the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife said.
"At approximately 7:30, Helen’s husband was notified that someone had located her dog, without Helen, about a mile and a half from their home," the release said.
According to the release, the husband immediately called 911 and notified Kennebunkport police his wife was missing.
Law enforcement agencies searched for Baillie on roads in the immediate area but had no luck locating her. The Maine Warden Service was then called in to assist, the release stated.
When game wardens arrived to help, they were able to find out the GPS coordinate and approximate location of Baillie's cell phone, according to the release.
Game wardens Emerson Duplissie-Cyr and Tyler Harhart were able to find her phone in the woods, abandoned approximately 500 yards from the house," MDIFW said. "The pair looked and called for Helen in the immediate area, but when they couldn’t find her, they went back to bring a Warden K9 unit to the area."
After calling in a K9 unit to assist, Game Warden Chad Robertson and K9 Storm began to search the area shortly before midnight around where the phone was located, the release said.
Around 12:15 a.m., K9 Storm picked up on Baillie's scent and was able to locate her approximately 100 yards away from where the phone was found and more than 500 yards away from her home, MDIFW said.
"Helen had discarded some of her clothes when she was found, she was soaked from walking through the boggy woods and was shaking vigorously from the cold, as temperatures were in the low 40s," the release said. "She also was disoriented, and had difficulty speaking."
Robertson gave Baillie his shirt, Harhart gave her his jacket, and game wardens assisted her with walking out of the woods, the release stated.
Baillie was taken to a waiting ambulance where she was able to warm up and be taken to a nearby hospital for examination, MDIFW said.