A 3-year-old silver Lab named Twitch who lives in Frisco, Texas, is a very bad dog—and very lucky to be alive.
While his owner, Megan Black, was away on Christmas Day, Twitch wandered into the kitchen, seeking some yummy cookies that were sitting on a shelf.
To reach those coveted cookies, Twitch had to jump up in front of the stove. In doing so, he accidentally turned on a burner, which in turn started a kitchen fire.
Fortunately, Black received a cell phone alert that her home’s smoke detectors were activated. Black called her neighbor, Cissy Blaisure, who ran to the house. Through thick smoke, Blaisure removed Twitch and another dog, a 10-year-old Boxer named Asher. She was then able to put out the flames using a bowl of water before firefighters arrived.
The entire incident took less than seven minutes and was caught on a Ring video.
“I’m sitting there watching her in action on my camera,” Black told FOX 4. “I can’t do anything. I am just watching her save my house.”
Although the house has major smoke damage, the good news is that no one was injured, thanks to Blaisure’s speedy efforts. “Maybe it was female mom instinct. I don’t know. I was just trying,” she told FOX 4.
Dogs Causing House Fires More Common Than You Might Think
Twitch isn’t the only dog who’s started a house fire. Just six months earlier, a dog in Missouri managed to turn on a stove burner, causing a grease fire that destroyed most of the house. Fortunately, like Twitch, that dog also lived to bark about it.
“New appliances are being seen with touch controls that activate by the simple touch of a finger. An animal’s paw can also activate these types of controls,” Southern Platte Fire Protection District Division Chief Chris Denney said in a statement at the time.
To prevent fires, Denney recommended using the built-in safety devices on these stoves when they aren’t being used and can be accessed by pets and children.
Animals including pets start about 750 house fires every year, according to the National Fire Prevention Association, which has these tips for preventing this from happening in your own home.