Mission Viejo’s Third Thermal Drone Dog Rescue Proves This Tech Isn’t a Gimmick

When strong winds forced Mission Viejo Animal Services to ground their drone last Friday, a 1-year-old Australian Shepherd named Lana was still somewhere in the steep canyons between Dove Canyon and Coto de Caza. The officers knew the technology could find her, they just had to wait for conditions to cooperate. That patience paid off Saturday morning when thermal imaging located the dog in dense brush a mile from her last known position.

This marks the third successful pet rescue using thermal drone technology for Mission Viejo’s Animal Services department, and it’s starting to look less like lucky breaks and more like a reliable system that other municipalities should be paying attention to.

The Pattern That Matters More Than the Rescue

According to NBC Los Angeles, the city received a call last Friday from a resident whose dog had bolted during high winds. Animal control officers responded to search the rugged terrain between the two communities, but weather conditions prevented a full drone deployment before darkness fell.

The breakthrough came Saturday morning after a resident reported hearing barking approximately a mile from where Lana was last seen. Officers returned with the thermal-equipped drone and located her heat signature in a steep canyon thick with brush, terrain that would have been extremely difficult to search on foot. Lana was reunited with her owner in good condition with no visible injuries.

“Mission Viejo Animal Services is proud to support community members when they need it the most and remains committed to providing professional, compassionate and innovative animal rescue services,” said Mission Viejo Animal Services Director Brynn Lavison.

The DAWG Connection Building a Municipal Model

The drone was provided by the Dedicated Animal Welfare Group (DAWG), a nonprofit that funds medical care for sick and injured animals and has become a critical partner in Mission Viejo’s animal services capabilities. This same partnership produced the successful rescue of a dog named Josie in November, when the thermal drone tracked her for nearly a mile along a remote trail before guiding her owner into position for the reunion.

What’s emerging in Mission Viejo is something worth watching: a municipal animal services department that has fully integrated drone technology into its standard operating procedures, not as a last resort but as a primary search tool. The city isn’t buying expensive enterprise drones for occasional use. They’re building institutional knowledge through repeated deployments, learning what works in Southern California’s challenging terrain.

This approach mirrors what we’re seeing from volunteer organizations like Sky Guardian Rescue in Wisconsin and commercial operators like TRACC Pet Recovery in Arizona, thermal drones are proving their value in pet rescue across vastly different environments and organizational structures.

DroneXL’s Take

Three successful rescues in a few months isn’t a coincidence. It’s validation that municipal investment in thermal drone capabilities pays dividends that go beyond public safety and into genuine community service. The partnership model between Mission Viejo and DAWG offers a template for other cities wondering how to fund this kind of capability without straining budgets.

What I find most significant about this story isn’t the rescue itself, it’s that the officers knew to wait for better conditions rather than abandoning the technology when winds were too high. That’s operational maturity. They trusted the system because they’ve seen it work before.

Expect more cities to follow this model as thermal drone costs continue to drop and success stories accumulate. The question isn’t whether thermal drones work for pet rescue, Mission Viejo has answered that three times now. The question is how long it takes other municipalities to catch up.

Editorial Note: This article was researched and drafted with the assistance of AI to ensure technical accuracy and archive retrieval. All insights, industry analysis, and perspectives were provided exclusively by Haye Kesteloo and our other DroneXL authors, editors, and Youtube partners to ensure the “Human-First” perspective our readers expect.