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CommunityMissing girls, 10, found safe after search in woods
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
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The disappearance Saturday of two 10-year-old girls from a beach by the Chesapeake Bay in Spring Ridge prompted a two-hour search by police and volunteer firefighters, ending with the children’s safe return.
The search was focused on a wide area around the home on Tippett Road of the grandmother of one of the girls. The girl was a Valley Lee resident accompanied by a friend from Lexington Park, St. Mary’s sheriff’s deputies report.
‘‘They had been playing on the beach near the house. They went into the woods looking for snakes,” sheriff’s deputy Cindy Allen said. ‘‘They decided to go for a nature walk, [and] became lost.”
The Valley Lee girl’s mother could not find either of the children in the woods, and the grandmother reported them missing shortly after 1 p.m. on Saturday.
Bay District and Ridge volunteer firefighters were alerted, along with the Lexington Park and Hollywood volunteer rescue squads, and they responded to Spring Ridge Middle School to stage a search of the area, county officials report.
Two all-terrain vehicles were deployed north to Far Cry Road. Allen said a Maryland State Police helicopter crew assisted the law officers and 35 volunteers who responded to the scene.
The mother of the Valley Lee girl eventually located both children on a nearby access road, the sheriff’s deputy said.
JOHN WHARTON
