Dog Missing for 5 Months Found, Rescued Amid Snowstorm

An FDNY lieutenant found and rescued a puppy that had been missing for five months near the department's training facility on Randall's Island and reunited the pooch with its owner.

The dog, Burt, had been missing from its Manhattan home since Aug. 20. Burt's owner papered hundreds of blocks, including 90 in one night, according to a Facebook page dedicated to finding him, over the months that followed to no avail. Then the owner got a call from Lt. Dave Kelly with the FDNY's training bureau.

"It was so crazy," said owner Lauren Piccolo of Harlem. "I was sitting at home trying to prepare for the storm, and I got a call from someone on Randall's Island, of all places, that he had seen a whippet and he had been seeing this whippet over the period of a couple of weeks."  

According to the department, Kelly noticed the dog rummaging for food at night on the grounds of the training facility. He tried to feed it in hopes he could get near enough to corral the animal, but the whippet -- looks similar to a greyhound -- kept eluding him.

On Monday, as the dangerous snowstorm bore down on the region, Kelly set a trap using food and a dog cage and snagged Burt. He scoured social media for leads and found the Facebook page, then was able to reunite him with his "ecstatic" owner, the FDNY said.

Burt turned 1 in November. Piccolo said the pup has been tired from his long journey, but seems healthy. He was headed to the vet for a checkup Tuesday afternoon. 

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