A RUNAWAY dog was reunited with its worried owner thanks to a resourceful team of police communications officers.

Angela Mack was driving to Stansted Airport - where she works as an airport communications and intel support supervisor in the control room - along the A120 in Marks Tey when the car in front of her swerved to avoid something in the road.

Despite it being 5am and dark, Angela could see it was a dog and stopped the car.

She managed to get the pooch's attention and called her into the car.

The German Shephard did not have a nametag so Angela took him into work and staff launched a Facebook appeal.

Colleague Liz Myers took a detour to Braintree police station and borrowed a micropchip reader which showed the details on the system were not up to date.

The team had called a dog warden in to help, but before he could arrive the rightful owner got in touch to say the curious canine called Rebel was hers and had escaped through a missing fence panel.

After calling off their frantic search, the owners picked up the dog from the airport.

Angela said: "I was quite shocked to see the car in front of me stop and swerve, and even more surprised to see a dog standing in the middle of an unlit fast road.

"She looked very scared and frozen to the spot. I immediately opened my car door and encouraged her in as I feared for her safety being left in the middle of the road.

“She was a big hit with all of the staff and officers at Stansted Airport police station, very friendly and well behaved.

"She even attended our morning meeting.

"It was a pleasure to be able to reunite her with her owner.”