YPSILANTI TOWNSHIP, MI -- An all-out search for a missing grandmother had a happy ending last week, thanks to a police K-9 and the efforts of more than 150 volunteers and law enforcement officers.

Kimiko Astalos, 85, walked away from her Ypsilanti Township home about 9 a.m. Thursday, Sept. 19, near the area of Stony Creek and Merritt Roads, according to the Washtenaw County Sheriff’s Office.

Astalos’s daughter Ellen Johnson said throngs of police and volunteers kept showing up to help, but around 6:15 p.m., as sunset neared, she really began to worry.

“I said ‘Oh my gosh. It’s going to get dark. What are we gonna do? She’s not around. We can’t find her.' Mounted police said ‘We’re going to have to pack up. The horses are tired,’" Johnson recalled.

But the horses kept going.

“It was (Sheriff’s Sgt.) Eugene Rush who never gave up. And those people were working for 10 hours,” Johnson said.

She said the mounted units stayed on the search until about 1 a.m.

The next day, state police arrived, Johnson said. They urged everyone to leave Rolling Hills Park, where teams had been searching, so police could send in the dogs.

Two K-9 units from state police, two from the Washtenaw County Sheriff’s Office and one from Ypsilanti Police were sent in at 9 a.m. Friday, Sept. 20. Aerial and mounted units were also part of the search, police said.

“What I ended up setting up is a grid pattern of that area," said Trooper Jeffery Schreiber.

"We try and work with the local K9s,” Schreiber said. “You have to search the area again and again, until you locate them. Everybody had an area to search.”

Sheriff’s deputies kept the area clear of anyone but police K-9 units. The key is to make sure no one else is in the area so the dogs aren’t disturbed from tracking their target, Schreiber said.

“We have GPS units for each of our dogs. Not only so the chopper can they see where we’re at, people in operations can see where we’ve searched before. If we missed any points previously, we can go back to those locations,” Schreiber said. “It’s nice to have the technology.”

It was Schreiber’s own dog, Hildago, who came through.

“My dog popped out and started tracking. You just have to have trust in your dog and let them go,” he said.

Hildago was ready to roll, even after finding a “bad guy” in a separate incident earlier that same day, Schreiber said.

“(Hildago) knows … when to turn it on and turn it off," said Schreiber, who has been working with the 4-year-old German shepherd for three years.

Schreiber said Hildago loves people and was named after a Florida street where his late grandfather lived.

“Every dog has their own personalities. They’re just like kids,” he said.

State police dogs train once a week, and are called upon to help with missing person cases about as often, said Schreiber, who’s worked in K-9 units for nine years.

Police began the search at Astalos’ home and had been working their way outward.

Soon after Hildago was put on the job, he found her.

“I found her in 10 minutes. That was the amazing thing,” Shreiber added.

She was inside the wooded Rolling Hills Park, half a mile from her home, face down in thick brush, without shoes on, police said.

Johnson was overcome with relief that her mother was found alive.

“I have five children and I didn’t know how to tell them (if) she was dead,” Johnson said, tearfully.

“At least it was warm through the night, but she had been dehydrated."

Johnson said her mother is now doing well, back in the care of her nursing home.