'Back from the dead': Missing dog returns home after 10 years

PHILADELPHIA: A dog that mysteriously went missing over a decade ago has been reunited with her family after 10 years, leaving the owners in shock.

In 2008, Debra Suierveld’s children were playing with their black lab mix, one-year-old Abby, outside their Apollo, Pennsylvania home, when the dog ran off, never to be seen again.

The Suiervelds searched for Abby, but after being unable to find her, eventually declared the dog dead.

But, on January 30, Abby returned from the dead.

Suierveld assumed it was a mistake since she happened to have her two dogs with her at the time. She was then told the dog they’d found was named Abby.

‘I didn’t even know what to say,’ Suierveld told Trib Live, adding that she and her family had ‘mourned’ for Abby when they thought she was dead.

She told the Tribune Review that she and her family had “mourned” their pet, after Abby wandered off while playing with her children outside their house.

But she received a call from the Animal Protectors of Allegheny Valley shelter, who had tracked her down via the dog’s microchip. Abby had been listed as deceased by the vet who had micro chipped her.

“She kind of came back from the dead,” Ms Suierveld told the newspaper. She said her daughter Carly, now a student a Miami University, Ohio had wept upon being told her childhood pet had returned.

“My kids all want to know if she answers to her name,” Suierveld added, saying she was delighted to learn that she did.

She said the dog was found about 10 miles from her former home on the front porch of a woman named Judy Spiering, who contacted the police about the discovery.

They, in turn, called the animal shelter, which reunited Abby with Ms Suierveld.