Cadaver dogs trained to detect dead bodies are being used to find Naya Rivera after ‘drowning’
TWO “human remains detection” dogs have been enlisted in the grim search for Glee star Naya Rivera who vanished on Wednesday while boating with her four-year-old son.
The “highly qualified” German Shepherds, trained to detect gasses emitting from human cadavers, at Lake Piru in on Thursday evening.
They are undertaking a search along a grid of the lake and potentially lead divers to body, according to the California Rescue Dog Association.
The nonprofit agency, which trains and deploys search dog teams to assist and other public safety agencies in the search for , confirmed on Friday that “two CARDA water HRD canines have been deployed to assist in this search."
Rivera, 33, from the area on Wednesday, according to authorities.
Eric Buschow, of the Ventura County Sheriff's Office, said during a news conference on Friday that the dogs helping with the search travel on boats on the lake.
As the boat moves through the lake, the dogs detect smells that they then alert investigators to.
Buschow said he wasn't aware of the dogs detecting anything yet.
The captain added the situation is "difficult because we don't know if she'll be found five minutes from now or five days from now."
He said that authorities are no longer putting the same amount of divers in Lake Piru as they did on Wednesday or Thursday, and are now using sonar to see if there are any detectable objects in the lake.
Buschow said that so far, the objects divers have gone into the water to investigate have not been Rivera.
Authorities said they've interviewed people who were on the lake on Wednesday when Rivera and her son were.
Buschow said that next month, the lake will be drained to around 65 feet so "seismic retrofitting" could be done to the lake's dam; he said this was pre-planned and is unrelated to Rivera's disappearance.
On Wednesday, , was found alone sleeping on the adrift pontoon boat three hours after he and his mother set out on the water together around 1pm.
The little boy was spotted shortly before 5pm by a boat rental company worker, who alerted authorities.
Rescuers reached the little boy soon after with the child said that his mother had "jumped into the water but didn't come back up."
Her life jacket was reportedly still in the boat and Josey was asleep when the vessel was first found.
Divers searched the lake until nightfall, but were unable to find the actress, who starred in 113 episodes of the from 2009 to 2015.
The sheriff's office said on Thursday morning that this "may well be a case of drowning."
";We’re continuing the search today for Naya Rivera today. We have a lot of assets helping with the search," Deputy Chris Dyer said.
"We have Ventura County Sheriff Search and Rescue, Ventura County Fire, Los Angeles County Dive Operations, Ventura County Aviation, and drones as well."
"We’re still hoping to find her alive. It’s a search and rescue mission. We’re searching the water and the shoreline."
Earlier on Thursday, Buschow told The Sun: "The search continues this morning with dive teams assisting us. This is an ongoing search operation that could last several days."
The Lake Piru Recreation Area, located about 55 miles northwest of , features boat rentals, kayak, and paddleboarding.
The 1,200-acre reservoir with a 12-mile shoreline in Los Padres National Forest has been the site of numerous drownings over the years.
The tragic deaths include that of Naftoli Smolyansky, 39, who drowned after saving his five-year-old daughter who had fallen in.
Smolyansky was with his children the lake when his daughter fell off the boat,
Steve White, a one time Ventura State Beach lifeguard supervisor, described the perils of the lake.
“Someone will come to the beach, maybe wade out a little, step into a deeper hole or get picked up in a rip current and they begin to panic,” he said.
Rivera, who starred as cheerleader Santana Lopez in Glee, has experienced challenges in her personal life following the end of the award-winning show.
In 2017, the actress was arrested and charged with domestic battery after allegedly assaulting her actor ex-husband Ryan Dorsey — who stars in the hit crime drama Ray Donovan — in an argument over their child.
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The charge was dropped after Ryan told prosecutors he no longer wanted to proceed with the case. The pair divorced in 2018.
Two days before she disappeared, Rivera posted a heartbreaking final picture of her and Josey with the words “just the two of us.";
Rivera started acting as a four-year-old on the CBS sitcom The Royal Family and made guest appearances on a number of shows, including The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Family Matters, and Baywatch.
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