VIRGINIA BEACH, VA — A senior citizen with dementia is safe after disappearing from a hospice facility.
On Saturday, Virginia Beach officers searched on the ground while pilots with the aviation unit patrolled the sky, and within minutes were able to find the senior citizen, all thanks to special technology.
Sgt. Mark Miller, the supervisor for the aviation unit, believes success in finding the missing 80-year-old man came from utilizing a world view of the ground versus a linear one.
"The officers on the ground are restricted to foot they don’t have that overlap view," Miller said. "The odds are that they or a K-9 unit would’ve gone into that wooded area and would’ve searched along the ditches and eventually found him, but we did it much quicker."
Because of the helicopter's technology, the aviation unit said that the equipment used was not only time-saving but lifesaving.
"We’re pretty certain that if he had been in that water any longer that he probably would have succumbed to hypothermia or would’ve been severely injured," Miller said.
Miller said technology that aided in the rescue included the use of an advanced spotlight and body temp detecting equipment known as a FLIR ball.
"It basically detects temperature variances between human beings or an animal or a building or something that is warm compared to something that is cold and it compares it to the surroundings so in this case as you see in the video—they were able to adjust everything so they could get through the foliage the leaves of the trees and everything and his heat signature was very evident once they were able to get to that point," said Miller.
Once the missing senior citizen was located, the crew on the ground was guided by the pilots in the air.
Officers said the missing man was found in a 12-foot ditch filled with a foot of water. After he was freed, a rescue team took him to the hospital to be checked for injuries or hypothermia.
Sgt. Miller said this sort of bird's eye view makes a big difference.
"One of the misconceptions is that when we go out to find something or somebody, we are successful if we only find them but on the other side of that coin if we don’t find something then it eliminates the fact," adds Miller.
The Virginia Beach Police Department said it's one of three aviation units for law enforcement in the state.
