Firefighter Adopts Abandoned Pit Bull Puppy He Rescued

On their way to a call on a cold and rainy October morning, firefighter Mike Thawley and the Sacramento Fire Department Engine No. 14 crew spotted a sickly, 3-month-old Pit Bull puppy who’d been tied to a fence and abandoned on a Sacramento street.

The shivering puppy’s legs were swollen and covered with scabs. She’d lost most of her hair due to mange.

The crew drove on and responded to the call, but returned afterward to rescue the puppy. They brought her to the fire station, where they gave her a bath and plenty of TLC. Then they took her to the Front Street Animal Shelter so she could be treated for her mange.

Thawley, however, had no intention of leaving her there. He, his wife and their three daughters decided to foster the puppy, who they named Chunk.

“We all just kind of fell in love with her,” he told the Sacramento Bee.

Almost four months later, Chunk has completed her treatment for mange — and she has a loving new forever home. Thawley and his family have adopted the dog he rescued. He told the Sacramento Bee that from the moment Chunk joined his family, he knew she’d become a permanent member.

“I think what’s great about this whole story is that not only did this dog find its forever home, but had the opportunity to go to a foster home, which we’re always looking for at our shelter, to get happy and healthy,” says the Front Street Animal Shelter spokesman Bobby Mann in a video posted on the Sacramento Fire Department’s Facebook page yesterday.

The best kind of failures? Foster failures! I wish Chunk and the Thawleys many, many happy years together.

Photo via YouTube