Couple remain hopeful missing dog will return

Pippin's owner Jane Moore has suffered memory loss through a stroke, and keeps asking for Pippin, not remembering she has disappeared

The owner of a dog who has been missing for a month said he remained hopeful he and his terminally ill wife would be reunited with their pet.

The Caister Lifeboat and volunteers using drones have helped search for Pippin, a brown and black Yorkshire terrier cross who was last seen on Saturday.

The dog went missing from Haven Seashore Holiday Park in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, and a two-hour sea search found no signs of her.

Andrew Moore, 62, Pippin's owner who was holidaying from Redditch, West Midlands, said: "We are getting occasional sightings of her. We had one on Sunday night, and that gives me hope that she is still alive. Slim hope, but hope."

Pippin has been missing since 18 September but her owners are hopeful she will be found safe and well

Mr Moore explained that he realised five-year-old Pippin had gone missing when he and his wife returned to their caravan at the holiday park.

He added: "I was trying to help her [his wife Jane] into the van, and I thought I had closed the gate, kicked it with my foot, and it didn't latch.

"Two or three [people] on the holiday park and I met a man on the dunes in Great Yarmouth and he said he saw a little black dog swimming a long way out to sea, so the Caister Lifeboat went out to sea and couldn't find anything either.

"We are hopeful [of finding her].

"The expert advice is that she is almost certainly still out there and as the weather turns colder, and as fireworks are set off, she will go and find help in some way."

Andrew Moore, in the brown shirt, with members of a search party that have tried to find Pippin

Mr Moore said the charity Drone to Home, based in Newmarket, Suffolk, had helped with day and night searches.

He said there have been regular sightings, but none had led to Pippin being returned to him or taken to a vet.

He added: "Pippin was one of the things that helped my wife with her illness, in that she would climb onto her lap and my wife would tell her all her thoughts.

"My wife Jane has various illnesses all caused through terminal cancer, one of which was a stroke which the treatment caused, and that affected her memory.

"She keeps forgetting she [Pippin] isn't with us and keeps asking for her and it's heartbreaking."