Mount Pleasant resident Dr. Frank Ardito lives in a home with a spectacular view of Lake Michigan. The house is set back about 50 feet from a bluff that slopes steeply down to the shore, and it was over this bluff that Ardito's beloved dog, Cheyenne, disappeared one dark and stormy Feb. night.

As is the habit with many dog owners, Ardito was taking 12-year-old Cheyenne, a black lab, out for the last time in the backyard before bed when he suddenly lost sight of her.

"I turned for just a second and she was gone," he said, shaking his head. "She doesn't normally leave my side so I thought maybe she was just around the front of the house."

But Cheyenne wasn't in the front yard, and she wasn't anywhere Ardito looked during an increasingly frantic two-hour search through his Lake Park neighborhood. By the time he got home, he was hoping Cheyenne would be back, too, but she wasn't. Still, Ardito searched the backyard and the thick brush bordering each side of his yard.

"I had a flashlight because it was dark and raining and finding a black dog in the dark is not easy," he said.

Ardito said he was panicking and didn't know where to look. The heavy winds brought waves crashing loudly to the shore, but when there was a brief lull in the noise, he said he heard rustling of branches. He walked to the edge of the bluff and shown his flashlight around, and the beam caught the gleam of Cheyenne's eyes some 15 to 20 feet down the slope.

"I was glad to know where she was, but now it was almost worse because I couldn't get to her," Ardito remembered. "She was impossible to reach, and I didn't know who to call."

His brother told him to call 9-1-1.

"The dispatcher could not have been kinder," he said. "She was empathetic and told me to keep the phone with me, that she would call over to the (Lake Park) station and have some guys come down."

A few minutes later, the dispatcher called back and said a crew was on their way. Ardito said since he lives so close to the Lake Park fire station, he didn't expect a full response, but that's what he got: a full size fire truck pulled up and a three-man crew came around to assess the situation.

Scott Walquist, a 20-year veteran of the department, said Cheyenne wasn't that far down, but how to get to her was going to be tricky.

"We surveyed the area and picked two big trees to use to tie off, got Mike (Mansell) geared up so he could go over the side and got to it," Walquist told Patch. "The side of the bluff is littered with fallen trees and a lot of brush and debris so we had to be careful, but we got her up."

Cheyenne wasn't wearing a collar and at about 80 pounds, was too heavy for Mansell to just carry while Walquist and Travis Carlson pulled him up. Ardito said he watched while Masell fashioned a harness out of rope so Walquist and Carlson could bring the dog up first and then Masell.

"But he didn't just hook up her," Ardito said. "Mike, he calmed Cheyenne down by talking to her and then he checked her over to make sure she was okay."

Walquist didn't seem to want any thanks.

"We're just glad that everyone came out of it okay," he said.

But Ardito wants the crew to know how much he appreciates the way they treated him and his dog.

"They treated her like she's a valued member of my family, and she is," he said. "People who don't have animals don't understand what that means."

Walquist understands.

"Dogs are family," he agreed. "Of course we wanted to save her to make sure she was okay, but it was obvious how (Ardito) feels about her and we wanted her to be okay for him, too."

South Shore Fire Chief William Bouma said his guys don't want to be thought of as heroes because whether they're rescuing a person or a beloved dog, they're doing their jobs.

"They don't want any special recognition," he told Patch. "It's all part of their jobs and they love doing it."

Surprisingly enough, Cheyenne didn't suffer any serious injuries. Ardito said he took her to the vet to be sure, but other than a few scrapes and bruises, she was unharmed.

"She seems recovered for the most part, maybe a little more fearful of that area of the yard, but her body seems okay and her personality is back to normal, too," he said. "I am very fortunate that she wasn't hurt and that South Shore responded like they did."