Silvia Reyes and her family adopted a 1-year-old Pit Bull mix named Candi on Saturday during an event held by Miami-Dade County Animal Services.
Just two days later, Candi returned the favor by saving the lives of her new forever family.
Monday night, as Reyes, her husband and their 13-year-old son were sleeping in their Pinecrest, Fla., townhouse, Candi started barking downstairs and wouldn’t stop.
“We heard a lot of barking and howling,” Reyes told Local 10. “To my surprise, at one in the morning, I came down and our kitchen was engulfed in smoke.”
The smoke was pouring out of the refrigerator. “The compressor was making some kind of bad connection,” Reyes said.
Everyone was able to get out of the house safely, although the hero dog began vomiting and having breathing difficulties.
The Reyes family rushed her to an animal hospital, where X-rays revealed she had suffered a collapsed lung due to smoke inhalation. She spent the day there yesterday, receiving oxygen and IV fluids.
Candi is now back at home with her grateful family, and is expected to make a full recovery.
“She rescued us. She saved our lives, I promise you,” Reyes told Local 10. “I mean, we were sleeping. We wouldn’t have known otherwise.”
Ted Nelson of Portland couldn’t have picked a better time to look out his window Saturday. Precariously perched on a balcony of the high-rise apartment building across the street was a Bichon Frise.
The small dog “had ended up climbing through the railing on its balcony and it was perched on this little ledge,” Nelson told KGW. “You could tell it was distressed.”
Worried that the dog would fall, Nelson ran across the street and stood below the balcony 14 floors above him. “I said I might have to try and catch this dog,” he told KGW — and he was right.
The dog lost his footing and fell.
“I just looked up at it and it was looking at me, and it landed right in my chest,” Nelson told KGW. He said he caught the dog for a moment, then “kind of fell, it did hit the ground. It let out a yelp but it was a huge relief to hear it yelp.”
Nelson and his girlfriend rushed the 5-year-old Bichon, whose name is Mordy, to an animal hospital. Despite falling 14 stories, thanks to Nelson, Mordy only suffered a few bruises.
Amazingly, Nelson previously saved the life of another pet on a balcony. Last year, he happened to see a cat about to fall.
“The owners were home in that case. We were able to yell at them,” the hero told KGW.
“Hopefully that’s it. Hopefully there’s no more incidents.”
Mordy’s dog dad, who wasn’t identified, told KGW the incident has been traumatizing for his family, and he’s extremely grateful Nelson took his heroic action to prevent a tragedy.
When a woman saw a stray Pit Bull on the Parkway East in Monroeville, Pa., yesterday, she did what most animal lovers would do. She pulled over and tried to coax the dog out of danger and into her car.
But the dog got frightened when the woman approached her and ran — right off a 200-foot-high overpass.
The distraught woman flagged down a Woodland Hills EMS (WHEMS) truck.
“We were looking at the distance the dog fell and pretty much thought we were looking at a bad case,” WHEMS Director Frank Mastandrea told CBS Pittsburgh. “But when we got there she was just lying there, whimpering.”
Miraculously, the Pit Bull had survived the fall, but was in bad shape. The WHEMS crew rushed her to the closest animal hospital and paid $720 out of their own pockets for her initial emergency treatment.
The dog, whom the crew named Ophelia, had several broken bones, an injured lung and internal bleeding. A veterinarian estimated the total cost of her care would be more than $8,000, WTAE reported.
Ophelia was wearing a pink collar but had no microchip. The vet said she could stay at the hospital while they tried to find her owner, but the WHEMS crew didn’t want to waste time waiting. They took her to another hospital, Pittsburgh Veterinary Speciality & Emergency Center (PVSEC), where Ophelia was immediately designated a special case.
“Ophelia will remain with the critical care service for the next several days as her life-threatening injuries heal,” Dr. Christine Guenther of PVSEC told WTAE. “She has a lot of injuries and a tough road ahead of her, and we appreciate the outpouring of love and support for her.”
Once Ophelia’s condition stabilizes, she will need surgery on both her front legs.
To help cover the costs, the WHEMS crew created the GoFundMe.com campaign, “Save Ophelia.” In just one day, the campaign surpassed its $10,000 goal. The WHEMS crew said any of the funds that are not used will be donated to an animal shelter.
Ophelia has “a tough road ahead of her, and we appreciate the outpouring of love and support for her,” Dr. Guenther told WTAE.
If Ophelia’s owner doesn’t come forward, members of the WHEMS crew have expressed interest in adopting her.
“When you look into those big, brown eyes of hers and she just looked so sad. The crew just fell in love with her,” crew member Angie Fry, Ophelia’s potential future dog mom, told CBS Pittsburgh.
“We help people, but it’s great when we get an opportunity to help an animal as well.”
Thousands of pets have been displaced by the Butte Fire and Valley Fire wildfires that are burning now in Northern California. Here’s how you can help them.
Since it began July 29, the so-called Rocky Fire in Northern California has spread across more than 100 square miles, destroying 43 houses. As of Friday, it was only 50 percent contained.
“This is a very fast-moving wildfire,” Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant told Reuters Aug. 2. “Within a five-hour period last night 20,000 acres burned, and that is unprecedented growth in that short amount of time.”
More than 2,000 firefighters have been battling the blaze. Thursday, two of these heroes from the Sonoma Valley Fire & Rescue Authority stopped to save an injured Leonberger.
“Took a break from firefighting to save this slightly burned, very dehydrated and tired dog my engine crew found wandering,” wrote Ted H. in the description of a video he posted on Instagram. One of the firefighters shared his sandwich with the dog.
“Called animal rescue in and they took him to doggie hospital,” Ted H. wrote.
Another lucky Rocky Fire pet is a cat from Clearlake Oaks. Her pet parent, Brian Foster, was able to quickly evacuate his home with his family and cats, but one cat went into hiding and had to be left behind, he told CBS San Francisco.
That cat apparently used one of her nine lives to survive the fire. She’s still hiding, however. “Once the other cats come home, she’ll come out,” Foster said.
To help this dog and other animals displaced by the Rocky Fire, you can make a donation via the Orphan Dog: Rocky Animal Fund, a crowdfunding campaign started by the Northern California rescue organization Orphan Dog.
When Yolanda, a guide dog who lives in Philadelphia with a blind woman in her 60s, smelled smoke coming from the basement early yesterday morning, she called 911 on a specially equipped phone.
She then woke up her dog mom and led her out of the house, saving her life — for the second time. Last year, Yolanda called 911 when her dog mom fell and lost consciousness.
The woman was taken to a local hospital and treated for smoke inhalation. Yolanda is also being treated for smoke inhalation by Penn Vet, according to a tweet this afternoon from the Red Paw Emergency Relief Team, a Philadelphia nonprofit that provides relief for displaced pets & their pet parents.
The two may have lost their home, but they still have their lives — and each other.
“Yolanda is a superhero!” the Red Paw Emergency Relief Team wrote on its Facebook page yesterday. I couldn’t agree more.
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