Man lost in Maine bog found by Game Warden K9 team

Responders carry a missing Etna man to a waiting helicopter. (MDIFW photo)

ETNA, Maine - A missing 74-year-old Etna man was found safe early Monday afternoon after he spent nearly 30 hours lost in the woods.

Game Warden K9 team Luna and Michael Latti located Joseph Nolin, of Etna, at approximately a mile from his house deep in the woods at the edge of the Etna Bog. Nolin was unable to move, and was hypothermic and dehydrated after spending the night outdoors in temperatures that dipped below freezing.

K9 Luna and Warden Latti were searching the bog, and according to Latti, Luna signaled she was on to something through a change in behavior, and then she took off on a scent at the same time Latti heard a yell. Luna then stopped about two hundred yards away, and began barking, signaling she had found Nolin at approximately 1:45 p.m. Nolin's son later told wardens that his dad said he heard a bell (attached to Luna's collar) then all of a sudden a black lab appeared and started to lick him and he knew he was saved.

Though unable to move, Nolin was alert and talkative and told wardens how he had gotten turned around in the woods and became lost, and walked till he couldn't move anymore. He also said he wouldn't have survived another night in the woods. Wardens gave him food, Gatorade and warmed him with blankets as they devised a way to get him out of one mile of woods and to medical personnel.

Game Wardens contacted the Maine Forest Service, then cleared an area of the bog for a Forest Service Helicopter, and Maine Forest Service Helicopter Pilot Chris Blackie deftly landed the helicopter on the floating bog near Nolin. He was then loaded into the helicopter and transported to a waiting ambulance near his son's house. Nolin was examined by emergency service personnel and released once he warmed up and was rehydrated.

Nolin had last been seen on Monday morning around 8:45, prior to him leaving the area of his son's residence on the Dunham Road in Etna to go check his game cameras that were in the expanse of woods behind his house.

When he didn't return yesterday, his son reported him missing last night around 7 p.m.

The Maine Warden Service was assisted in the search by Maine Search and Rescue Dogs, Etna Fire and Rescue, and Carmel Ambulance.