On the coldest day here in five years, Ellen Raffio felt winter’s bite more than most.

She had just gotten home in Bow with her new dog on Saturday Feb. 4 when temperatures were still well below zero. The newly adopted family pet, a powerful, two-year-old 65-pound German Shepherd appropriately named Ice, could run like the wind.

Raffio opened her car door, then tried to leash Ice, who broke free and sprinted away. She disappeared for five days before a team effort led by Granite State Dog Recovery, a head-up excavation crew, the police and Raffio herself found Ice across the Merrimack River, near Pembroke Pines Country Club.

After her adventurous ordeal, Ice spent her first night at her new home last Thursday night. She wagged her tail a lot and never barked.

Along the way, however, Ice caused a couple of small traffic jams as drivers attempted to corral her. She also increased the stress level of her new family by a lot.

“Sunday, I was so panicked,” Raffio said, referring to Day 2 of this ordeal.

The day before, with temperatures below zero and windchills making it far colder than that, Raffio visited a dog breeder in Hancock whom she trusted and bought Ice.

Ellen and her husband Tom, the president and CEO of Northeast Delta Dental, already had a Shepherd named Kolton and they wanted another.

“I had been thinking ahead that I wanted a puppy in the spring or summer,” Ellen Raffio said. “I called our breeder and he said someone returned a Shepherd, so I went to see him. It was cold that day.”

At first, there was no sign of trouble.

“I drove her home and she curled up in the back of the car,” Raffio said. “She seemed calm and I asked my sister how to introduce Ice to Kolton and she said to use a leash.”

Before securing the leash and before Ice had even seen her new home, she split.

“I had her by the collar in the back of the car,” Raffio said, “and she overpowered me and ran down the driveway. I was totally panicked because she was not coming back. Whistling did nothing. It was awful.”

Confused and unaccustomed to her surroundings, Ice stood on busy Bow Bog Road. Some cars circled around, others stopped and tried to help.

“They tried but they just scared her,” Raffio said. “They scared her so much that she went and moved back and forth and then ran into the woods. She didn’t know any of us and wasn’t coming to me, either.”

Raffio called Granite State Dog Recovery, which has a solid record of finding lost dogs and returning them to their owners. They’re all volunteers, run by people who have full-time jobs.

Meanwhile, she received tips saying Ice had been spotted. An emailer said he wanted money to return Ice.

Most people wanted to help. Raffio was alerted that Ice had been spotted near the railroad tracks in Bow. She was told to bring meat. She brought steak tips.

“The plan was she would smell them and come to me,” Raffio said. “With all the people around, she ran down the road. My daughter called Granite State Dog Recovery and they said to let her go for now and wait it out. She was not in the condition to be caught. We went home.”

Somehow, someway, Ice made it across an icy part of the Merrimack River and landed near Pembroke Pines Country Club. She had been clipped by a car somewhere along the line and injured her paw.

During the week, an excavator crew who was working nearby and had shared some pizza crust with Ice. That convinced Ice to stick around. The workers notified the folks at Granite State Dog Recovery, who then called Raffio.

The plan was to set up a feeding station and a trap. A camera had already confirmed that Ice had claimed this area as her own.

The trap worked. Raffio gave credit to Holly Mokrzecki, the founder of Granite State Dog Recovery, who took a hands-on approach to find Ice.

“She said, ‘We have your dog,’” Raffio said. “I was so shocked. I didn’t even know they were still working on the case.”

Mokrzecki was unavailable for comment.

Testing at the animal hospital showed that Ice was in good health besides her injured foot. In the Capital Area Veterinary Emergency and Specialty parking lot, Raffio collected Ice and crawled into the back of the car with the dog and told the veterinarian assistant to shut the door.

Then Raffio climbed to the driver’s seat, leaving Ice secured in the back.

“I know (the vet assistant) thought I was crazy,” Raffio said. “But I could not lose her again.”

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