A missing 6-year-old child has been found safe after going missing for about two days in rural eastern Kentucky earlier this week.
For two days, hundreds of searchers scoured rugged terrain for Roman Heilman, who has autism and was last seen Sunday afternoon near his home in the small town of Louisa, wearing a green plaid jacket and Crocs.
It is unclear how the boy initially disappeared or who reported him. Travis Hughes, Lawrence County’s emergency management director, told CBS News that Heilman was known for playing outside and exploring the woods.
More than 300 volunteers on foot and horseback — along with specialized units from the Kentucky State Police and Kentucky National Guard and search and rescue teams from West Virginia and Ohio — combed the densely forested area around the clock while helicopters and drones searched from above.
They eventually found a muddy footprint that led them to Heilman’s clothes, including a jacket, pants and diaper, Hughes told CBS News.
“We knew this child was without clothes and we knew the weather was getting better and raining,” Hughes said. “So we wanted to place our teams there on horseback with the researchers on the ground.”
Volunteers were asked to sing one of Heilman’s favorite songs, “If You’re Happy and You Know It,” in hopes of bringing him out of the woods.
Then Tuesday morning, about a mile and a half from his home, Heilman came out of the brush with his dog, naked and covered in scratches, said Hughes, who also indicated that the dog was believed to have been with Heilman when he disappeared.
“He comes out right behind his dog and that’s when he pointed and said ‘EIEI O’ and pointed to the horses,” Hughes said. “And that’s when our team came up to him, wrapped him in a blanket and fed him.”
Heilman was recovering from dehydration at an area hospital Wednesday, officials said.
In a social media post, Hughes praised the overall rescue effort, saying that at one point so many people came forward to help that “we had to ask additional volunteers to wait while we organized the resources we already had.”
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