Search Dogs Help Track Down 8-Year-Old Boy Missing at Day Pond State Park

Local firefighters and police were able to track down an 8-year-old boy who went missing for about 30 minutes at a nearby state park this past week.  

Colchester police and firefighters received a report around noon on Sunday of a grandfather who was out walking his grandson at Day Pond State Park when he called 911 to report that he and his grandson had become separated, said Colchester Fire Chief Walter Cox.  

The park, while mostly in Colchester, borders East Hampton and is located near East Haddam.  

As a standard procedure, the responders enlisted the help of police tracking dog and all-terrain vehicles to expedite the search, and police used the scent of the 8-year-old's mother’s clothes to track down the boy, Cox said.  

The boy was found within 30 minutes, he said, and wasn’t in the woods for any real length of time. He was unharmed and the search was called off.

“It was over quicker than it fortunately had started,” Cox said.  

Still, Day Pond State Park is an easy place to get lost for someone who is not familiar to the terrain, which is hilly and has a lot of trails as well as the Salmon River, Cox said.  

“He had a cell phone, was able to call 911. Fortunately in that particular area there’s excellent cell phone coverage in the woods,” Cox said.