Odds Slim for Finding Dog Lost in Manhattan SEARCHERS Dr. Diana B. Kirschner and her parents posted fliers offering a $5,000 reward for the return of her lost dog, Zoey. LOST in New York: One small dog. No identification. What are the odds? Naysayers and cynics beware, this is a story about a black and tan 27-pound mutt named Zoey, who was lost, and about a family's unrelenting efforts to find her - a pre-hurricane tale about hope that defies logic - and about, yes, the kindness of strangers. "We were never alone," said Dr. Diana B. Kirschner, an intern at Mount Sinai Hospital, who, with her family and friends, spent seven wild days and nights on a frantic odyssey through East Harlem, Washington Heights and other Manhattan neighborhoods in search of her dog. "Total strangers," said Dr. Kirschner, who adopted Zoey five months ago, after seeing her picture on a Web site for abandoned dogs. They would see me crying and come up to me and ask how they could help. It all began early on a balmy Sunday morning last month, when Dr. Kirschner's 70-year-old father, Marc Kirschner, took Zoey out to Central Park, where they jogged up to the Harlem Meer together to watch the ducks. They were about to head home when two smaller dogs approached and Zoey, in her excitement, slipped out of her collar and playfully started to run. Mr. Kirschner gave chase but could not keep up. "I'm screaming for help," Mr. Kirschner recalled, as Zoey left the park at West 110th Street and began dodging cars in the street. Mr. Kirschner flagged down a taxi but soon lost sight of the dog, at West 115th Street and Lenox Avenue. With no identification, no money and no cellphone, Mr. Kirschner borrowed the taxi driver's phone to call home to break the news to his wife and their daughter. "I told them to jump into cabs," recalled Mr. Kirschner, explaining that the initial idea was for each of them to take a taxi to try to find her, an approach they soon realized would never work. Instead, the three returned to Park Avenue, where they decided that the best strategy would be to post fliers within a one-mile radius of where Zoey was last seen and hope that someone would spot her. Mr. Kirschner's son, Philip, designed a flier that included two small photographs of Zoey, a brief description and a message: "Lost Dog-Zoey $5000 REWARD," "family is devastated." They made 1,000 copies. By now it was time for Dr. Kirschner to report for work at the emergency room, which she did, while her parents, her brother and her boyfriend, Nicholas Schwartzstein, set off for the streets of East Harlem to post their mountain of fliers on every lamppost and in every storefront they could. On Monday, the day after Zoey vanished, the Kirschners received a call from Capt. Jessica E. Corey of the Central Park Police Precinct, who told them that on the morning Zoey disappeared someone had called 911 at 8 a.m. to report a black dog limping along the West Side Highway near the George Washington Bridge. Could it be Zoey? Initially elated, the Kirschners studied a map and concluded that the distance between East Harlem and the bridge would have been impossible for the dog to traverse in just an hour. Nevertheless, they decided to expand the search, lugging sacks of fliers to the upper reaches of Manhattan's West Side. Their mission took them to Fort Tryon Park, Morningside Park and the neighborhoods of Inwood and Washington Heights, through vast boulevards, playgrounds, and dog runs. Still there were no leads. Calls came in, but they were mostly from New Yorkers they had met along the way, hoping for news. Then a boy who sounded about 13 called, saying that he had seen the dog in the park but that it had run away. When Nancy Fisher, Dr. Kirschner's mother, asked to talk to his father, the boy hung up. Had he really seen Zoey, or was it a prank call? A man who said he lived in Brooklyn called and said that he had Zoey in his backyard, but that he would not give any further information to the Kirschners unless they could identify the numbers on her collar. Zoey did not have a collar.