Law enforcement used their eyes in the skies to locate a missing boy south of Clarkesville.
The juvenile, who has health issues, wandered away from his home off North Mize Road on Monday. Around 11:40 a.m., Habersham County sheriff’s deputies, fire, and EMS personnel responded to the area.
Deputy Sheriff Justin Williams, an FAA-certified drone pilot, deployed a drone.
The drone’s camera spotted the boy at the same time as ground personnel saw him near a creek on nearby property, a short distance from a pond.
The sheriff’s office purchased the drone last year. In addition to providing assistance with daytime searches, it’s equipped with thermal imaging which is useful at night.
Habersham County Sheriff Joey Terrell says that in situations such as occurred Monday, “valuable time is saved when we’re able to get an earlier start on searching a wider area while additional resources are traveling to the area.”
A Georgia Department of Corrections K-9 unit arrived on the scene just as the child was located. Authorities canceled the air support they requested from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and state patrol.
The child was not hurt, and a sheriff’s deputy safely returned him home. The entire operation took less than an hour. Just before 12:30 p.m., emergency crews cleared the scene.
This is the second successful search for a missing juvenile in Habersham County this month. On March 11, local and state agencies searched for and found an 11-year-old autistic boy who had wandered away from his home in Cornelia. The young boy was safely reunited with his mother.
