The two samoyed dogs that were recently rescued from the middle of an expressway have been returned to their owner, animal rescue authorities said Monday, marking a happy ending to an incident that sparked concerns from animal lovers across the country over the weekend.

Dangjin Animal Shelter, which had been looking after the dogs, told The Korea Herald that they were reclaimed by their owner living in Dangjin, Chungcheong Province, on Monday morning. The elderly owner had left her door open by mistake and the dogs wandered from their home, until they found themselves standing in front of the oncoming traffic.

She was unable to contact the authorities over the weekend due to the homepage being temporarily disabled due to traffic, an official at the center said. The dogs did not have identification microchips, which made it hard for the authorities to track down the owner of the dogs, who are 3 and 5 years old.

The incident had sparked nationwide interest after a South Korean man Kim Gang-eon, posted videos of the dogs’ rescue at the Seohaean Expressway on his Instagram page on Saturday. Kim saw the animals as he was passing Dangjin, and the videos from his car’s black box showed the two dogs standing by themselves in the road.

"I got out of the car and called to them, and they came over to me wagging their tails. They got on the car as if they were used to it, and sat quietly as if they belonged. They were not at all jumpy at the sight of people," he wrote on the post, saying the dogs must be used to riding in a car.

"I urgently uploaded the video (of the dogs) so that their owners would see it, in the hopes that they have not been abandoned," he added.