2 posts tagged “awww”

March 11, 2008

CORE, W.Va. (AP) -- Life jackets are made for people, not dogs. So, when Randy Earl's small boat capsized while he was fishing with his dog Lacy, a black spaniel mix, he stayed in the water with his life jacket while making sure Lacy was OK.

"When the boat flipped over, I put the dog on top of the boat," Earl told The Dominion Post of Morgantown.

While waiting for someone to rescue them on Mason Lake in northern West Virginia, Earl clung to the 12-foot boat's hull. The water temperature was about 50 degrees, said J.M. Crawley, a senior conservation officer for the Division of Natural Resources.

Another fisherman, Jan Thorn, watched from shore as a state trooper paddled out to rescue Earl and Lacy.

"He asked the state trooper to take the dog first," Thorn said. "It was very touching."

Earl, 53, said Lacy means a lot to him and his wife since they lost both of their children in a car accident 15 years ago.

"That dog is like a child to us," he said.

by Iain Rogers
Fri Feb 1, 2008

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German medical student got some unexpected practical experience at the zoo when she gave the kiss of life to a baby tiger choking on a piece of meat, the zoo director said Friday.

The student was passing the enclosure with her toddler son on a visit several weeks ago when she noticed the 4-month-old tiger choking and offered her assistance to the helpless keeper, said Andreas Jacob, director of the zoo in the eastern German city of Halle.

"The tiger tried to eat a piece of meat that was too big and started choking and shaking and then fell over," the student, Janine Bauer, told MDR radio.

"We got the piece out but he wasn't breathing so I tried mouth-to-mouth and heart massage," she added. "After 3-5 minutes he came to, thank God."  

The zoo, which held a ceremony Friday to thank Bauer, has decided to call the tiger Johann, after her one-year-old son.