A RESCUE dog from Bromsgrove is helping find missing people after he qualified as a search and rescue dog.

Border Collie Dyno was adopted by Matthew Massey as a six-month-old puppy from the Dogs Trust Shrewsbury rehoming centre.

Matthew, who lives in Bromsgrove with his wife, Mandy and 15-year-old son Andrew, wanted to find a dog who could potentially join him as a volunteer with the Severn Area Rescue Association (SARA) - and Dyno ticked all the boxes.

He said: “Search and rescue dogs need to have a high work drive, be intelligent, energetic, love people and want to interact with them.

"They also need to love toys as they form a big part of the reward based training.

"It’s quite a long list but when I chatted to staff at the centre, they immediately suggested Dyno and as soon as I met him I knew he ticked all the boxes!”

After more than two years of training every other weekend, which Matthew fitted in alongside his job as a gardener, Dyno has now graduated, achieving the Search and Rescue Search Dog Standard accredited by the National Association of Specialist Dog Users which governs and trains dogs for the police and security services, along with the Ministry of Defence.

He is now a lowland search and rescue dog for SARA and is on call for West Midlands and West Mercia Police.

Since graduating he has been involved in eleven searches for missing people.

Matthew added: “He took to the training straight away and picked things up very quickly.

"We can be called out to help day or night, 365 days a year and although he’s a great family dog, as soon as his SARA jacket goes on he knows he’s working. He gets really excited and starts barking.

“The police contact us to either confirm that a person isn’t in a particular area or to actively search for a person. Our latest search covered a rural area of around four miles and it’s vital that Dyno is focused at all times to maximise the chance of the search being successful. He is turning out to be a real star. We’re very proud of him.”