A nine-year-old boy has been reunited with his pet tortoise seven months after she went missing.

Harvey Dean-Evans was ‘devastated’ when Mary escaped from her home in Wigan last August.

His parents Jodie and Ryan soon gave up on the search, assuming the reptile had been stolen, after ‘searching all over’.

‘It’s fair to say nobody in the family thought we’d ever see Mary again, given the weather and the time missing, we just thought there’s no chance,’ Jodie said. 

‘Mary is used to being outside. During the summer, we regularly let her out in a small pen and she’s quite well-known on the estate.

‘But that evening in August, she somehow got out of the garden and despite searching all over, there were just no signs of her and we thought she’d been taken.’

With fears for Mary mounting during the winter months, all seemed lost.

But, earlier this month, she was spotted by Ben Baxendale, a grounds maintenance worker for power firm Electricity North West, at an 11,000-volt electricity substation powering Norley in Wigan.

‘At first, I thought it was some sort of toy on the floor then I saw the tortoise move and retract its head into its shell’ Ben said.

‘It was certainly a strange one and something I’ve never dealt with before, I put the tortoise in a bucket and thought I’d knock on a few doors but knew if it wasn’t anybody’s we’d have to find it a home for the weekend.’

Ben knocked on some front doors of homes nearby to the substation to try and find Mary’s owners and the first person he found was Harvey’s grandma.

She was able to identify Mary and then Harvey and the rest of the family rushed around to see her.

‘There was all sorts of emotions when we saw Mary, it was such a heart-warming moment to see the smile on Harvey’s face’ said Jodie, who also has pet turtles and terrapins.

‘He’s really into his animals and loves everything about nature, he was devastated when Mary had gone missing but seeing his reaction when she was found made a few of us cry.

‘I honestly can’t thank Ben and Electricity North West enough, they really did make Harvey’s day.’

Ben said: ‘We always make it clear that no one should ever enter our substations – they have “danger of death” signs on for a reason – but this is the first time I’ve seen a trespassing tortoise! I’m just delighted we could return her safely to where she belongs.’

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