Holly the K9 heroine as widower, 91, survives for six days lying in field

A 91-year-old man who survived six days and five nights lying in a field was last night sitting up in his hospital bed, enjoying tea, toast and a boiled egg.

And the specially-trained sniffer dog who tracked him down was being treated to a well-earned game of catch.

The gardaí, civil defence and rescue teams involved in the search were toasting a happy end to what they feared would be a tragic loss. But for the mild spell and the super instincts of Holly from the K9 Search and Rescue Team, Joe Walsh, a widower from Caherclough, Lisronagh, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, would almost certainly have died.

“It was unbelievable. I saw grown men cry last night when we found Joe,” an emotional Sgt Kevin Bowen said. He could barely express the relief and elation at finding the popular Lisronagh man alive.

“So many people teamed together for this search. Farmers left crops standing in their fields and people from the whole area were out with us looking for this missing man.

“I was in the next field when we got the call that Holly, handled by Noel Murphy, had found him. And my heart leapt when it was followed quickly with the news that he was alive.

“It’s nothing short of a miracle that this man survived six days and five nights with no food and no water. He was a bit disoriented and dehydrated but was otherwise fine. One of the first things he asked us was the dog’s name,” said Sgt Bowen.

Mr Walsh, who suffers from Alzheimer’s Disease, was last night recouparating in private with his family at St Joseph’s Hospital in Clonmel.

K9’s front man and Holly’s trainer, Mick McCarthy, said it took the labrador/collie cross just 10 minutes to find the missing man once she was led into the general area. “ She’s a great dog. Her reward for finding the man was that we threw a ball over and back to her. That’s all she wanted.”

It’s the eighth time that Holly was called in on a search operation. It was the first time someone was recovered alive.

K9 is a voluntary operation based in Midleton, Co. Cork.