Hudson Valley State Trooper’s Heroic Rescue

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Last Sunday, Valentine's Day, was just another day on patrol for New York State Trooper Nick D'Angelo, who is stationed out of post 602 in the Town of Bethel and Liberty. Patrol was nothing out of the ordinary, until D'Angelo was dispatched to a call that involved a possible missing girl.

Trooper D'Angelo told us that he was dispatched to a heavily wooded area off of State route 55 in the town of Bethel around 2:30 in the afternoon on Sunday to a report of a missing girl who hasn't been seen in a while and could be lost in the woods.

The Middletown dispatcher told D'Angelo everything he needed to get an investigation underway when he arrived on the scene. D'Angelo told us, "They give us a lot of information going to something when we really don't know what's going on, so I want to shine the light on the job they do."

When D'Angelo arrived he and another man, a groundskeeper for the land, got together to try and start a search for the missing girl. D'Angelo said that the groundskeeper found footprints in the snow coming out of a horse barn and that's where they decided to start their search into the woods.

D'Angelo told us that he and the man entered the woods to try and find the missing girl at around 2:30 p.m. and spent around 2 and half to three hours following footprints in the snow. D'Angelo had some help in the search as he told us that his zone sergeant also responded to the call a flew a drone over the area to try and help. As the men searched D'Angelo told us,

"I knew it was getting dark and I could tell we were getting close because her strides started getting smaller in the snow like she was getting tired."

That's when the men picked up the pace and with the help of a Sheriff's deputy, they spotted the girl in the woods. D'Angelo then sent the deputy over to see if it was who they were looking for, and sure enough it was. D'Angelo told us that when they asked the girl why she went into the woods, she responded with "She just needed to get away for a little while." D'Angelo did say that, "she was in better shape then me and the other guy were after the search." The search lasted about 3 hours according to D'Angelo.

The girl was taken to Orange Regional Medical Center for treatment, and was in stable condition according to The Yeshiva World. Great job everyone!