Determined Police Dog Tracked Down A Missing Teen

Union County Sheriff's Office

When a teen went missing, the police department went to the dogs. Well, they went to one dog specifically.

When a North Carolina teenager ran away and their family got worried, the Union County Sheriff's Office called in Maverick, a two-year-old English Labrador retriever. Maverick is specially trained to track scents. The family gave the deputies a blanket that held their missing child's scent and the deputies gave it to the Maverick for a good sniff. Once he figured out the scent, Maverick was on the trail.

"When you're walking down the road or walking down a path, you leave scent behind. And so Maverick picked up on that scent and was able to track it," Lt. James M. Maye, a public information officer for the sheriff's office, told Good Morning America.

Tracking that scent, it took less than an hour for the very good dog and and his handler, Deputy Josh Dye, to find the teenager. According to a Facebook post shared by the sheriff's office, "the track led Maverick and UCSO deputies along a busy highway South of Charlotte but Maverick never wavered in his tracking abilities." Soon enough, Maverick had followed the trail all the way to the missing youngster who was found unharmed.

The family was reunited and Maverick was given a well-deserved treat for a job very well done. The sheriff's office celebrated Maverick's quick work with a treat and a shout-out on social media, where they said the dog was a "huge asset" to the department. "We're just really thankful that this situation turned out great and that all the training that they do every day was put into use and then it worked just like it was supposed to," Maye told GMA.