A 91-year-old woman sparked a massive search operation after she went missing from her home in the early hours of the morning.

Scores of police officers combed the streets around Chapel House in Newcastle after the elderly woman's family reported her missing at 1.10am on Saturday.

The force helicopter was also drafted in to scour the area and search and rescue teams were called out. Police dog handlers searched streets on foot, while motor patrols cars with loudspeakers drove around the area.

The huge operation also led to specialist police search advisers being consulted and two search and rescue teams began work.

After more than two hours, the pensioner, of Coldside Gardens in Chapel House, was found safe and well. She turned up at a stranger's house in the Throckley area - more than three miles from her home.

Officers then reunited her with her family.

A Northumbria Police spokesman said: "Members of her family reported her missing during the early hours.

"The search and rescue team was called out and a helicopter.

"Following a search, a member of the public spotted her at about 3.15am. We were very concerned for her safety because of her age, the weather and the time of the night she went missing.

"Fortunately she turned up."

The disappearance of the elderly woman had similarities to an incident last month when 83-year-old Beatrice Johnson went missing.

But she was found dead just yards from her home in Fawdon, Newcastle, after vanishing late at night in her nightdress.

Her body was found nine days after she went missing about 50 yards from her front door.

An investigation has now been launched into the way Northumbria Police handled the disappearance of the Alzheimer's sufferer and the incident has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.