Search and rescue heroes who worked through the Japan and Haiti earthquake wreckage were called to save a trapped cat yesterday (May 1).
The four-man team from West Sussex Fire and Rescue spent more than seven hours trying to release the cat after it became wedged between a flint wall and a residential garage in Worthing.
The owner of the poor puss was taking her two pets to Grove Lodge Vets in Upper Brighton Road on Tuesday afternoon (April 30) when their cage door swung open.
One of the felines ran off and is still currently missing, but the other became stuck while trying to make its own bid for freedom.
It was released at around 2pm yesterday and is now staying overnight at the vets.
Rescuers originally planned to knock down part of the garage wall, located in Lamorna Grove, but the owner of the garage refused permission.
This forced the team to draft in a local building firm to help knock down part of the flint wall, owned by a housing association in London.
One of the rescuers told The Argus: “We helped search for survivors in Japan and Haiti after the earthquakes a few years back but it felt like a losing battle with this little fella.
“Every time we went to get a rope around him he would contort his body. He was very distressed but he wasn’t helping himself.”
'Painstakingly slow'
Stuart Rodd, of Rodd Brickwork, described how the cat was sedated before he undertook the “painstakingly slow” rescue mission.
He said: “We had a call in the early afternoon from the vets who asked us if we could come down to help.
“It was painstakingly slow as we had to chizzle each individual flint with a hammer. We couldn’t just go in all guns blazing and smash through the wall in one go as the cat would have got hurt.
“It was sedated before we started the work and it took about an hour or so before it was eventually pulled out alive, which is great considering it had been there since the day before.”
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