Chihuahua sniffs out girls lost in forest‎

On Monday, life stood still for David and Rebecca Parga of Newnan, Georgia. Their two little girls, Carlie, 8, and Lacey, 5, were missing. Also with them was Carlie's best friend, Victoria Baker. It was at about 4 p.m. when the girls took their dog, Lucy, for a walk down to the cul-de-sac. What was supposed to be a quick stroll turned into an all-out search. "We tried to find our way out of the woods," Carlie said. "We kept following paths and stuff and we got lost."

The girls wandered through the trails with Lucy for more than two hours. "We were scared we were going to get lost more," Carlie said. Carlie's and Lacey's father said once the girls didn't come back from their walk, he knew something was wrong. "It is not like them to wander off," David Parga said. "They were nowhere. I start running through the woods, calling at different spots, they are not answering, and I'm not hearing anything, so my wife called police."

As police, firefighters and neighbors searched for the children, Carvin Young, who lives across the street, joined in as well. He grabbed his 3-year-old Chihuahua and started looking. "Bell sniffed them out," Young said. "She smelled them, her tail went to wagging and she kept running and running until she got to them. She started jumping up on me and I knew we were close." The girls were found on the opposite side of the woods where they went in.

Carlie's and Lacey's mother, Rebecca Parga, is grateful that her kids play with Bell almost every day and that the dog was able to pick up their scent. "A sheer blessing that she (Bell) lives across the street from us," Rebecca Parga said. "Bell is familiar with them, and she knew they were back there, she knew my kids. That's what kept drawing her to go in that direction." The girls were a little scared when they were found but were not hurt. "She is a good dog, everybody loves Bell," Young said.