Elation at the return of Thames

WELCOME BACK: Family, fellow police officers and well-wishers walk police dog Thames the last few steps out of the Tararua Ranges with his handler Mike Wakefield. PHOTO/ NATHAN CROMBIE

Constable Mike Wakefield was elated to find his police dog Thames, a week after he disappeared in the Tararua Ranges, as winds howled and dark clouds cloaked the mountains yesterday.

His wife Stacey and two young sons met him and Thames alone to share a private family reunion on a track leading down from the High Ridge area where Mr Wakefield and a volunteer searcher stumbled across the dog early yesterday afternoon.

About 50 members of the public, including Carterton Mayor John Booth, off-duty police officers, fellow dog handlers and search party volunteers cheered and clapped as Mr Wakefield, his wife and sons arrived at the Holdsworth Lodge carpark about 5pm yesterday.

Mr Wakefield said Wairarapa LandSAR head Constable Tony Matheson and Senior Sergeant Peter Rix, who had joined two teams of off-duty officers and other volunteers for the weekend search, had spotted signs of Thames hundreds of metres up on High Ridge in off-track terrain on Saturday.

"It was pretty positive and pretty fresh sign so we went back to Totara Flats hut and hatched a plan to go back on to High Ridge. We didn't need all of us so two of us decided to go. We hoped we could lead him out with fresh sign and sure enough we were walking along and there he was.

"He just sort of popped up and got as much of a fright as we did," he said.

"I was pretty happy, pretty excited. Elation really, a lot of elation. I gave him a big cuddle and something to eat and drink.

"Out in the tussock we came across him and he was getting blown sideways. Up on the top there, it was ugly. The visibility wasn't too bad. We were in the cloud line. But the wind up there was amazing."

Thames was in good condition, Mr Wakefield said, despite soreness in a back foot, although "you wouldn't know he's been out running round in the bush for a week".

Television crews and newspaper reporters and photographers had greeted Mr Wakefield and Thames alongside fellow Wairarapa dog handler Constable Lloyd McKay and other handlers including officer in charge of the Wellington police dog section, Senior Sergeant Mark Davidson.

"The support's been huge. That's what's kept us going. The guys that've given up their time is just phenomenal. LandSar guys have taken time off work - they've come up on the weekend and that's why we're here.

"Realistically I wouldn't have been up there by myself in the conditions - they were pretty ugly up there but those guys really know what they're doing."

Mr Davidson said Mr Matheson had been pivotal in resuming the search on Saturday and ex-deer culler John McCann, who spotted paw prints in heavy weather, helping bring the last-ditch operation to a successful end.