Joy as family pet missing since truck crash found

The family dog ​​who went missing in the Bay of Plenty following an accident on Tuesday has been found alive after locals joined the search.

On Tuesday afternoon, Sam and Mike Tepania, their four children and four-year-old dog Faye were involved in an accident on the Kaimai Range on State Highway 2 when their truck rolled over, breaking the window. Faye the dog was thrown out the window and ran away in fear. Despite a search by locals, she remained missing until Wednesday evening.

Bay of Plenty local Brenda Crook had been helping search for the dog since 9am on Wednesday, bringing along her own dog, Jacko, a blue hooker, to help pick up Faye’s scent. After searching for many hours, Crook’s dog found Faye resting in the bush after injuring her leg.

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“I really wanted to help and others joined me. Jacko was so happy to find her. I’m delighted. Faye was scared but not badly hurt. I wrapped her in a blanket and gave her some treats and water. She’s sleeping with a snore now. I’ll take her to the vet tomorrow.

The family, from Whangārei, had visited Ōpōtiki in the Eastern Bay of Plenty for Easter. They were driving home on Tuesday in the pouring rain when their truck skidded on the road.

“The road was so wet and slippery from the rain that when the wheels spun Mike had to correct the situation quickly to keep it from getting into oncoming traffic. That’s when we drove four or five times – it was terrifying. My youngest is only five, but luckily one of the other kids held him tight as we rode,” Sam told Stuff.

The family was taken to Tauranga hospital in an ambulance but were not seriously injured. However, they were so distressed that Faye the dog was nowhere to be found.

“We saw her running down the road and turning into a kauri track. My son jumped into a car with a passerby who had stopped when we crashed to see if we were okay. They tried to catch her, but she was so scared that she ran into the bush.

Since then, the local community has been searching for the dog, hunters have joined in and someone has lent a drone. The family went to the scene of the accident and found paw prints on the track in the bush where the dog ran away, but Faye was nowhere to be found.

“I left my sweater there, a few of her cookies and a blanket hoping she would follow the scent,” Sam said.

The family had to return to Whangārei without Faye to bring the children home safely, and they had traveled as far as Wellsford, north Auckland, when they received a phone call that Faye had been found.

“We are all so happy, the children are delighted. This woman had been looking for Faye since this morning with her own dog. It was her dog that sniffed out Faye’s whereabouts. She has a broken leg, or it could be her ankle, and is going to need veterinary treatment. So we’ll just sort the kids out with some friends to take care of them and then head straight out.

Sam said the family wanted to thank the community of Bay of Plenty who rallied behind the hunt in Faye.

“It’s been amazing – we’re so grateful. We don’t know the area, but the paramedic who took us to the hospital pointed us to community sites to put it on, and it’s been shared so many times. A group of hunters gathered to search in the bush, and someone with a drone had also been searching. People went to the crash site just to help look. It’s overwhelming, and we thank you with all our hearts for helping find Faye – it means everything to us,” Sam said.