Angela Harris awoke Friday morning to the news that a young woman in Hoover was missing.

It was a gut-punch, a feeling she knows all-too-well.

And, like she has done repeatedly since her daughter, Aniah Blanchard, was abducted and murdered nearly four years ago, Harris jumped into action.

She quickly rallied her troops, and she got in touch with Talitha and Carlos Russell, parents of 25-year-old Carlee Russell who vanished overnight in Hoover.

A volunteer command post was set up in the parking lot of the Hoover Met. Harris helped lead a community search in the area where Carlee’s red Mercedes was found running, but vacant, on the side of Interstate 459 Thursday night.

Harris is always one of the first volunteers to show up when someone is reported missing. “Just knowing the pain they’re going through,’’ she said, “I have to be.”

Blanchard, a 19-year-old Southern Union Community College student from Homewood, vanished in 2019. More than a month would pass before she would be found dead from multiple gunshot wounds in Macon County.

“Every person’s story is different, every missing person’s case is different,’’ she said. “And I have to look at all those facts before I react and do something,” Harris said.

“But when I got the call about Carlee this morning, I immediately jumped up and said, ‘Oh no,’’ she said. “They need me.”

Harris said teams of volunteers on Friday spread out from Tuscaloosa to Vestavia Hills to Gardendale to hand out flyers.

After Hoover police investigators finished with their grid search Friday morning of the area where Russell’s car was found, Harris and Russell’s family and friends conducted one of their own.

“We went back up there just to go,’’ Harris said. “A lot of people don’t understand, and I do.”

“As a mom, you have to go and explore every inch. I would want to know where my daughter’s car was, like Aniah, I went to where her car was found. I had to,’’ she said. “And so that’s why we went. I’m not Carlee’s mom and I didn’t know them until today, but my heart is all the way in it and with them.”

Right now, Harris said the volunteer searchers are limited because there is no place to search.

“It’s the most frustrating,’’ she said. “That’s why I told the family, whatever you feel in heart, where you think you need to go, go.”

“Because when Aniah was missing, if I felt something, I was going,’’ she said.

“That’s what keeps them going to be honest,’’ Harris said. “They need to stay busy and look for their baby.”

Harris is telling those who want to help to keep sharing Russell’s photo everywhere they can, and to keep looking for her as they go about their normal daily activities.

“Just please keep an eye out,’’ Harris said, “because she could be anywhere.”

The search began Thursday night when Hoover 911 at 9:34 p.m. received a call from Russell, said Lt. Daniel Lowe.

Russell told the dispatcher that she was near mile marker 11 when she saw a toddler walking alone on the side of I-459 between the flyover to the Galleria and Highway 150.

After calling 911, Russell stopped to check on the child and called a family member to report the same details, Lowe said. The family member lost contact with her, but the line remained open.

Officers who were already en route to the location of the initial 911 call located Russell’s vehicle and some of her belongings nearby but were unable to find her or a child in the area.

Hoover police have not received any other calls of someone missing a small child.

Authorities are not committing to any one theory in Russell’s disappearance, police said at a Friday afternoon press conference.

“We currently are investigating every possibility,’’ Lowe said. “We’re certainly leaving nothing off the table.”

Talitha Russell said her daughter left The Woodhouse Day Spa at the Summit, where she works part time, and stopped by Taziki’s at the Colonnade at 9 p.m. to pick up food for herself and her mother.

Talitha Russell talked to her daughter at 9:19 p.m. as she was leaving Taziki’s and heading to the Hoover home she shared with her parents.

At 9:36 p.m., Talitha Russell said, her daughter was on the phone with her brother’s girlfriend when she was pulling over on the side of the interstate after saying she saw a child alone that appeared to be 3 or 4 years old.

“She called 911 when she pulled over,’’ Talitha Russell said. “She got out of the car. I think she probably let her guard down thinking 911 would be there in a second.”

“My son’s girlfriend heard her asking the child, ‘Are you Ok? She never heard the child say anything but then she heard our daughter scream,’’ Talitha Russell said. “From there all you hear on her phone is background noise from the interstate.”

A Hoover police officer dispatched to Carlee Russell’s report of a child alone on I-459 arrived within three minutes, Talitha Russell said.

“Her car door was open, the engine was running, and they found her phone on the ground, along with her wig and her hat,’’ Talitha Russell said. “Her purse was still in the car. Her Apple watch was in her purse and her Air Pods as well.”

Talitha Russell said a tip was called in from a trucker who was traveling along I-459 at the time of Carlee Russell’s disappearance.

“He saw her red car with the door open and he saw a grey car with a tall brown skinned man with khaki shorts on leaning over in the car,’’ Talitha Russell said.

“The police did find some tire tracks in the grass,’’ she said. “They said because it was not a muddy area, they were not able to determine what type of vehicle it could have been.”

A reward of $25,000 is being offered for Russell’s safe return, and that is likely to grow.

Anyone with information is asked to call Det. Brad Fountain at 205-444-7562, Sgt. Drew Mims at 205-739-7274, or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777