The Dog Who Found the Trooper When the Trooper Couldn’t Find the Fire

Alaska State Trooper Terrence Shanigan was having a difficult time finding a fire somewhere in the back roads of Caswell Lakes, Alaska. His GPS had stopped working, and dispatchers were struggling to guide him through an area with roughly 75 miles of rural roads. He was about to make a wrong turn when his headlights caught something standing near an intersection.

It was a German shepherd. The dog walked toward the patrol car, looked at Shanigan, then turned and started running down a side road. Shanigan decided to follow him, and his dashboard camera recorded what happened next.

A Fire at the Heinrichs Family Home

Earlier that evening, April 4, 2010, 23-year-old Ben Heinrichs had been working on parts for his truck inside a detached workshop on his family’s property. He was cleaning parts with gasoline, and an electric heater was running nearby. The gasoline fumes caught fire, and within moments, Heinrichs found himself surrounded by flames.

His clothes caught fire, too. Heinrichs managed to escape the workshop and rolled in the snow to put out the flames on his body. He then closed the workshop door, hoping to keep the fire from spreading. That’s when he realized his German shepherd, Buddy, was still inside.

Heinrichs went back and let Buddy out of the burning building. He had suffered burns to his face and second-degree burns to one hand, but Buddy escaped without injury. Before the dog ran off, Heinrichs told him they needed to get help.

Buddy took off toward the nearby woods and the surrounding roads. A neighbor had already alerted authorities, and Trooper Shanigan was responding to the call. The problem was finding the property before the flames reached the family home.

Three Turns Through the Back Roads

Buddy was five years old and had never received any special rescue training. But when he encountered Shanigan’s patrol car, he appeared to know exactly where he wanted the trooper to go.

As the cruiser followed, Buddy ran ahead along the road, occasionally turning his head to make sure Shanigan was still behind him. The dog kept moving through the winding roads, taking three turns while the trooper followed. The entire sequence was captured by the camera mounted inside the patrol car.

Shanigan later explained that Buddy wasn’t behaving like a frightened dog trying to get away from a vehicle. He appeared to be leading him somewhere, and the trooper trusted him enough to keep following. After the third turn, the reason became obvious.

Buddy had brought Shanigan directly to the Heinrichs property, where the workshop was burning dangerously close to the house. With the exact location finally established, Shanigan was able to direct firefighters to the scene.

The workshop was destroyed, and a nearby shed suffered serious damage. But firefighters managed to save the family’s home, with only some window trim scorched by the flames.

A Hero With Four Legs

For the Heinrichs family, Buddy’s actions were remarkable, although they already had plenty of reasons to think he was an extraordinary dog.

They had raised him since he was about six weeks old. According to family members, Buddy had previously chased away bears on two separate occasions while Ben was fishing. He had already earned a reputation for looking after his family, but leading a state trooper through several turns to a burning building was something else entirely.

When the story reached the Alaska State Troopers, they decided Buddy deserved official recognition. On April 23, less than three weeks after the fire, Buddy attended a ceremony at Alaska State Troopers headquarters in Anchorage. Colonel Audie Holloway praised the German shepherd for his quick actions and the help he had provided during the emergency.

Buddy received an engraved stainless-steel dog bowl recognizing his diligence and assistance, along with a large rawhide bone. His family was also presented with a framed letter acknowledging what their dog had done. Ben Heinrichs called Buddy his hero and said he believed the family would have lost their home without him.

The dashboard footage soon spread across the country, turning Buddy into a national celebrity. Heinrichs later brought him to schools to help teach children about fire safety. The same dog who had guided a trooper to an emergency was now helping children learn what to do when something catches fire.

Six Years Later

Buddy eventually settled back into family life, although his remarkable run through the Alaska back roads continued to be shared and remembered. In February 2016, Alaska Public Media reported that Buddy had died after battling liver cancer. Heinrichs had made the difficult decision to have him put down the previous month.

Nearly six years had passed since Buddy led a lost trooper through the dark and helped save his family’s home. When Heinrichs was asked about the dog who had become famous across the country, he didn’t need a long speech to describe his old friend.

“He was a good dog.”