Lone Star Search & Rescue

Faith-based canine search and rescue team on a mission to serve

By Jeremy Hallock

Lone Star Search and Rescue Director Terry Benjamin often asks the question, “If not us, then who?”

Search and rescue is learned by failing, he says, not being successful.

His command trailer has been equipped with things they realized they needed on search and rescue missions. The radio system has a repeater so everyone can hear when someone calls in. The trailer now has two commercial grade generators after they lost power on one mission. They have chainsaws, a UTV, ATVs and infrared units.

Based in Wylie, the faith-based nonprofit canine search and rescue team is a ministry of The Cross Church funded by donations. With over 20 members, Lone Star Search and Rescue trains every week end and typically does about 35 searches each year. They partner with dozens of Texas and Oklahoma police departments, who essentially let the nonprofit handle search and rescue missions.

“We’re a force multiplier for police departments,” Benjamin said. “Once we get there, they don’t have to send out all their deputies and officers.”

About a third of their searches involve locating people with dementia who have gone missing. 

“Our dogs are perfect for that,” said Benjamin, who is also director of search and rescue for the Texas State Guard. “Because the prison dogs and police dogs all work off adrenaline or they bite the person when they find them.”

Originally from Texas, Benjamin was a retired police officer out of San Diego when he first started search and rescue missions on a horse. He learned visual trafficking in the Army and has now been involved with search and rescue missions for three decades. He has worked with dogs for over two decades. 

“Dementia folks go as far as they can until they get bound up,” Benjamin said. “Quite often we find them in the thick of the bushes or stuck on a fence.”

An experienced tracking instructor who worked with the U.S. Border Patrol and the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Benjamin’s interest in working with dogs began when he joined MARK9 Search and Rescue from Mesquite. He eventually retired from search and rescue missions and focused on raising his daughter. 

But shortly after his daughter went away to college in 2011, Benjamin says God woke him up one morning at 3 a.m. 

“God told me to start this team,” Benjamin said. “And he told me I needed a church to partner with. It was a change in my life. I knew it was God talking to me.”

Benjamin partnered with the First Baptist Church of Wylie, now The Cross Church, to establish Lone Star Search and Rescue. 

“Being faith-based, we just have a calmness about us because of who we have on our side,” Benjamin said. “We let God solve the problems and every single time he does. And we have a cohesion that you don’t see in every team.”

His wife, Michelle Benjamin, is the nonprofit’s co-founder and training captain. They immediately set their group apart from most search and rescue teams by adding a component that looks after families while searches are being conducted.

“This is a really traumatic time for them,” Benjamin said. “We have our flankers, our canine handlers and also a team of folks that help the families. We’ll pray with them if they like but we’re just there for them and help them through that process.”

Working with the families is often beneficial to the search as well, Benjamin said, because it yields extra information.

Lone Star Search and Rescue canines are trained for searches both in the wilderness and in urban settings. They are also trained for disaster scenarios and to locate human remains. Training the dogs takes about a year and a half. 

“It is not breed specific,” Benjamin said, adding that half of the nonprofit’s dogs come from animal shelters. “It is aptitude and desire of the dog. We have a series of tests we do with the dogs and potential handlers.”

Lone Star Search and Rescue certifies dogs with National Association for Search and Rescue and American Working Dog Association standards. Benjamin said German Shepherds, Border Collies, Labrador and Golden Retrievers, Pit Bulls and even Standard Poodles make great search and rescue dogs. 

“Dogs naturally smell just to survive,” Benjamin said. “We have to train the handler and the dog to talk with each other. And the dog has to realize that the handler cannot smell.”

Benjamin says his least favorite searches are on the water, although they typically take little effort.

“I hate doing them,” he said. “We always know what the outcome is going to be.”

Dogs quickly locate bodies in water. The team goes to the last place the person is seen and the dogs smell the gases from the body, which gather above the water. 

Some of the most difficult search and rescues involve extreme heat. 

“Most of our dogs are longhaired breeds and they overheat really quick,” Benjamin said. “Really hot weather is our worst enemy.”

But Lone Star Search and Rescue does not stop searching if there is a live victim. He mentions a particularly long search for a dementia patient who wandered for several miles down roads and through ranches. They found her in a creek bed holding on to some roots. Storms moved in moments later, Benjamin said, and created “floods that were just unbelievable.” 

They located another dementia patient who somehow climbed a 100-foot cliff. 

“The amazing part of this is that every one of my people are volunteers,” Benjamin said. “They are paying all their own bills, they take care of their dogs, every ounce of gas they use comes out of their own pocket. They have a dedication that’s just incredible. It’s who they are and what they do.”

Lone Star Search and Rescue is always looking for new members and donations. For more info, visit lonestarsar.org.