Scott County search, rescue unit goes across nation to find missing people

January is a terribly cold month to go boating on Kentucky Lake.

But members of a search and rescue team, with their dogs, from Scott County spent several days doing just that in 2009.

The Scott County K-9 Search and Rescue unit, formed in 2004 as part of the county's emergency management agency, had a mission to help find two boaters whose vessel had capsized about four weeks prior.

Marshia Morton, the unit's captain, remembers going out with her rescue dog at the time, Maggie, three times before finding the boys, who had drowned.

Maggie, an all-black German shepherd, jumped up quickly, digging furiously at the bottom of the boat with her paws. A bark signaled she had caught a scent of the bodies. Morton ordered the boat's operator to stop.

Claire Stadt, left, with her dog, Ms. Molly, and Marshia Morton with her dogs, Dusty, right, and Maggie, take a break from training Wednesday at Morton's home near Blodgett, Mo. Stadt and her dog were preparing for a search mission in Kentucky on Saturday. The two are members of the Scott County K-9 Search and Rescue unit. (Fred Lynch)

"She was all over the boat looking for it. She's very animated," said Morton, who before leading the Scott County unit was part of a rescue team in Tennessee.

The team marked the area's GPS coordinates and waited for Maggie to lose the scent.

"Three dogs alerted in the same area; not exactly on top of the kids, but it was the right area," Morton said. "It was a relief to give that family closure."

The Kentucky recovery mission is one of many Morton and the search and rescue team has been called to throughout the United States.

Morton said she approached the county's emergency management in 2004, at a time when it was looking for a project. An agency needing the help of the unit first contacts Scott County Emergency Management, which puts the agency with the team.

"We're the only search and rescue team between St. Louis and Memphis. I saw a need," she said.

The volunteer unit consists of 12 members who spend at least every weekend training for missions. Claire Stadt, who with her German shepherd Ms. Molly joined the search and rescue unit in the summer of 2009, recalls taking three training courses with FEMA to learn standard search and rescue techniques. She and Molly have spent months training and are prepared to join the team for the first time Saturday, when they'll help at a mission in Kentucky.

Stadt said she's feeling a combination of nervousness and excitement.

"It's going to be a new experience for the both of us, working together as a team out there. I think she'll do fine," Stadt said. Ms. Molly, now 18 months old, will fulfill her national certification requirements with Stadt in May. They'll be certified by the North American Police Work Dog Association, Stadt said.

While the Scott County unit has been called as far away as South Carolina to search for a woman who went missing during spring break, the largest mission they've helped with was after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Morton and the entire team were called in to clear an area about 30 miles from New Orleans, which meant locating the hurricane's victims among the debris. The crew, whose presence was requested by the Hancock County, Miss., Emergency Management Agency, arrived seven days after the category five hurricane hit the coast.

Although recovery missions don't produce the happiest of endings, Morton said it's about helping survivors find closure.

"It's a job for the dogs; they don't realize how much tragedy there is," she said. "For me, it's a calling. The body is a shell, and when you take your last breath you're no longer there. That's how you deal with it."

On some missions, such as with the National Center for Missing Children, the rescue unit is reimbursed for trip and other expenses. More often, however, funding comes from donations and their own wallets. For their trip to the Gulf Coast, members brought their own gasoline, generator and water due to the conditions.

"It was devastation everywhere," Morton said. "There was stagnant water down there, and you couldn't take a chance on the dogs getting sick."

Some handlers, like Scott Fornkohl, specialize in what the crew calls "live finds" -- a search for a person believed to still be alive.

Fornkohl, with his 3-year-old German shepherd Kenya, were called to assist in a search in 2008, a short time after the dog became certified to participate in missions. The search was in Paducah, Ky., where an elderly man was reported missing from a senior living center.

"Me and Kenya, we worked approximately two and a half hours. We covered about 65 to 70 acres," Fornkohl said.

The time between when the person goes missing and when the team is called is critical, according to Morton.

"A dog and a handler can reduce your recovery times, and it can happen 20 times faster. In bad weather that can make all the difference," she said.

Despite their quick response, the search wasn't successful, although the crew found out later the man had taken a ride to a city 40 or so miles away.

"It's basically a big game of hide and seek for the dogs," Fornkohl said. "When we train we'll get someone to help us, they'll take a toy and go hide. She'll look for him, and the toy is just a reward."

The search and rescue group has also been called to several states to follow up on tips that resurrect a cold case.

The unit's members always assist in the search, although they know the result may not be the location of the missing person or the evidence needed to break the case.

"Sometimes it's not that you find somebody or not find somebody, but you rule an area out. We just clear the area," said Morton, citing the South Carolina search as an example.

With 200 other volunteers, the Scott County unit helped to clear a 1,000-acre plantation near Myrtle Beach, S.C.

"So they know then where she's not at," Morton said. "A lot of times that gives the family some sense that people are still looking, that people are still trying to find their loved ones."

Morton will be recognized by the CUE Center for Missing Persons in Wilmington, N.C., March 26 with an award given annually to law enforcement or emergency personnel who've gone beyond their daily duties for a greater cause.

With the help of her team, Morton has developed an educational awareness program focused on high school and college students keeping themselves safe at all times. They'll launch the program April 16 at Three Rivers College in Poplar Bluff, Mo.

"I don't want them to be the reason the dogs are out searching," Morton said. "I want them to stay safe."

ehevern@semissourian.com

388-3635

Pertinent address:

273 County Road 524, Blodgett, MO

Benton, MO