It was a wurst-case scenario.
UK rescuers redefined “wiener dog” after deploying a sausage-carrying drone to rescue a mutt that had become stranded for days on a treacherous mudbank amid an incoming tide.
“It was a crazy idea,” Chris Taylor, the chair of pet rescue org Denmead Drone Search and Rescue, told the Guardian of the unorthodox lure.
The fiasco began January 13 after Millie, a Jack Russell-whippet mix, escaped from her leash in Havant, Hampshire, and ran off. She subsequently went missing for several hours before Samaritans later located the 3-year-old pooch on mud flats, where she risked being swept away by the tide.
Unfortunately, despite dispatching everyone from the coast guard to kayakers, the rescuers failed to extract the imperiled pup after two days, the Global News reported.
That’s when an idea hit: A drone pilot suggested affixing food to one of the unmanned aerial units and flying it over Millie’s head. The rescue squad checked with Civil Aviation Authority regulations, calculating that they could attach a single 2-ounce sausage to the drone.
Thankfully, a Samaritan was on hand to supply DDSR with sausage, whereupon the drone operators dangled it from a string and made a pass by the stranded pooch like an aerial angler, the Guardian reported.
“It was something we had never tried before — the sausages were the last resort, as we couldn’t reach her by kayak or any other means,” explained Taylor of the “last dish” effort.
Fortunately, Millie was unable to resist the meat’s aroma, and the drone pilots managed to coax her 300 meters to safety, per the BBC.
“If we hadn’t had got her away from that area, the tide would have come in and she would have been at risk of drowning,” said a relieved Taylor. “Because Millie was hungry, it worked at luring her away from the danger to higher ground, which wouldn’t go underwater.”
However, they weren’t out of the woods yet: After eating half the frankfurter, the cheeky mutt ran off into the woods. Fortunately, instead of returning to the mud flats, the plucky pup ended up at an industrial area, where she was rescued and reunited with her owner, Emma Oakes, the next day.
“Relief just poured over me,” gushed the grateful dog mom. “It was just absolutely fantastic to have her home.”
Taylor, for one, was also relieved the ordeal was over. “It was an unusual rescue — they aren’t normally this complicated,” the rescue team leader told the BBC. “The drone was worth its weight in gold in this case.”
In fact, he plans to employ the same sausage lure technique again if ever faced with a similar situation.