Sanford police say they will bring in bloodhounds Thursday to help search for a woman last seen on Jan. 22.

Friends of the missing woman, 40-year-old Kerry Rear, are planning to hold a candlelight vigil for her on Thursday evening.

Earlier this week, the Maine Warden Service searched the woods on foot in the area where she was last seen and provided a plane for an aerial search of the wooded area. Neither search turned up clues.

“We’ve spent a lot of time and resources trying to find her,” said Sanford police Chief Thomas Connolly Jr. on Wednesday. “But she has pretty much disappeared.”

Rear was last seen inside the Lil’ Mart convenience store in Sanford around 8 p.m. In a press release and store surveillance video posted on the police department’s Facebook page, Sanford police described Rear as being “disoriented, wet, and in stocking feet. She was extremely disoriented and believed she was in a bank.”

Police said she left the store, but returned a short time later and inquired about making a bank deposit. She was last seen walking toward Country Club Road wearing brown sweat pants and a black puffy jacket with a pink-lined hood. Connolly said that if Rear has a cell phone with her, it is either turned off or the battery is dead.

Connolly hopes the bloodhounds will be able to pick up Rear’s scent.

He was not sure when the dogs would arrive or who was providing them.

Police said that bloodhounds have a highly sensitive sense of smell and can pick up a person’s trail from a personal belonging or piece of clothing.

“We’re just keeping our fingers crossed,” Connolly said.

A Facebook page created by a friend says Thursday’s vigil will be held from 6 to 7 p.m. in Central Park on Main Street, across from Sanford City Hall.

Dennis Hoey can be contacted at 791-6365 or at:

dhoey@pressherald.com