After 7-Hour Search, Little Girl Found Safe Near Family Farm

NERSTRAND, Minn. (WCCO) -- A little girl is safe at home Wednesday after she went missing in southeast Minnesota for seven hours.

Sawyer Hanson, 4, wandered off from her parents' view around 6:30 p.m. Tuesday after she took a break from the trampoline to chase after the family cat.

Parents Nick and Christy Hanson looked all over for their daughter, surrounded by 300 acres of corn and soybeans.

"You're frantic," Christy Hanson said. "You think the unimaginable."

The Hanson family farm became ground zero within an hour as hundreds showed up to search for Sawyer.

First responders, family and friends had less than two hours of daylight before they were searching in the dark.

Finally, seven hours after Sawyer went missing, she was spotted around 1:30 a.m. by a family friend in a ditch less than a mile from the Hanson's farm.

"She put her hands up and sort of said, I'm done," Nick said.

When Sawyer got home, she still just wanted to know where her cat was.

Sawyer was OK -- she had a few scrapes on her face from running through the corn fields.

Based on what witnesses have told police and the family, it's believed Sawyer may have ran a span of three or so miles through the corn fields.