After nearly a month of heartache and stress, a Delta Air Lines passenger’s dog has been found at an Atlanta airport, three weeks after it went missing.
Traveler Paula Rodriguez’s 6-year-old pooch Maia was found safe at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport on Saturday after going missing in August, officials said.
“ATL’s operations team found her hiding near the North Cargo facilities,” the airport said in a statement. “She was exhausted but apparently in good health, was taken to the vet and was expected to return home soon.” hopefully.”
Maiya’s family flew in on Sunday to take her home.
Paula Rodriguez via GoFundMe
The accident occurred while Rodriguez and Maia were traveling from their home in the Dominican Republic to California on a two-week vacation. cnn, During a stopover in Atlanta, Rodriguez was informed by Border Patrol that his visa did not meet the necessary requirements and was told he would have to return on the next flight home.
Rodriguez was separated from her beloved mother and informed that she would have to spend the night alone in a detention center to await a flight to Punta Cana the following day.
“They called a Delta agent, who took Maia away from me,” Rodriguez told CNN.
When the time finally came that she could be reunited with her dog, Maia was nowhere to be found.
Rodriguez was forced to return home alone because he was not allowed to stay in the US for more than 24 hours without a visa.
“Anybody who knows me knows how much she means to me,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t go anywhere without her. She’s so well behaved that I literally take her everywhere to restaurants. She’s my companion in everything.”
Two days after Maia’s disappearance, a Delta representative contacted a panicked Rodriguez.
“They said she was being taken (to the plane) on the runway, and the staff had opened her kennel, and she ran out into the middle of the runway,” he said.
Since Rodriguez’s tourist visa was canceled, she sent her mother to Atlanta to help search for the dog. A gofundme was also set up to increase search efforts for the dog – it raised nearly $7,000.
Several weeks went by without an update from Delta, until good news came last weekend.
Hartsfield-Jackson Airport is the busiest airport in the world.