Feel-Good Friday: CA Fire Search and Rescue Saves a Dog and Her Puppies and a Rainbow Bridge Farewell

Just like our nation's veterans, our first responders are a cut above and deserve all the honor and praise we can give them. This week's Feel-Good Friday focuses on a responder who went above and beyond the call to rescue a pair of dogs and their puppies.

Since July 24, California has been battling the Park Fire, which has burned a total area of nearly 400,000 acres, becoming the fourth-largest wildfire in California’s history. The California counties affected have been Butte, Tehama, Shasta, and Plumas, and evacuation orders are in place. Sadly, this results in loss of life to animals because of the swift nature of the fire's spread, the immediacy of the orders, and the need to exit rapidly. When the evacuation orders were issued on that Wednesday, July 24, for Butte and other counties, one family attempted to escape with their two adult Rottweilers and their litter of puppies when their truck broke down. They had to leave the dogs and puppies behind in the truck in order to escape with their lives. When they got to safety, the owner gave the truck's location to the first responders, but the area was not immediately accessible due to the fire.

On Sunday, Butte County SO Search and Rescue operator Trevor Skaggs and BCSO pilot Conner Smith stepped up to go back in to see if they could locate and possibly save the animals.

A family of dogs was "presumed lost" after the raging Park Fire quickly cut off access to where they were stuck in California. Four days later, one search and rescue official took a helicopter and ran 1.5 miles to save them. https://t.co/3wjZ7DNDRD
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 29, 2024

It was amid those "frantic" evacuations, police say, that one resident's truck "became disabled" while they were attempting to leave a remote area above Cohasset. The Butte County Sheriff's Office said the resident was forced to leave their truck behind – with two adult Rottweilers and their puppies. The owner provided responders with the location of the truck, but the fire had already blocked access to it.
But on Sunday, four days after the evacuation, a search and rescue official named Trevor Skaggs went back to look for them. He was flown to the area on a helicopter.

After Conner hovered the helicopter above ground, Skaggs exited the helicopter and ran one and a half miles to the location given by the owner. Thankfully, Skaggs found the puppies and mother Rottie, still alive but dusty, tired, and thirsty. Sadly, the Rottie papa was not found. Skaggs fed the mama and her pups with a protein bar and then was able to lead the dogs back to the helicopter, still hovering one and a half miles away. They were all loaded back into the helicopter and out of the burn area to safety. All the dogs were taken to the Chico Airport and are now receiving care at the North Valley Animal Disaster Group. While one dog was lost, it is an absolute miracle that mama Rottie and the pups survived!

Now for a bittersweet turn, but my faithful readers will understand.

Many of you know of my love for dogs, and especially my three, two of which are senior dogs. Sadly, on July 18, we had to say goodbye to our oldest senior, Miss Maddie Gum Drops. Maddie was a Chinese-Crested Powder Puff who had just turned 15 on June 29, so she had good years, and we did our best to treat her well. Miss Maddie had battled several health issues for most of her life. She was born with a heart murmur, which has to be monitored and, as they age, can throw the dog into congestive heart failure quite quickly. About five years ago, she also developed a collapsing trachea, along with arthritis and blindness. Her last four years of life, she was on medication to keep her out of heart failure, and about a month ago, we put her on a special diet to try and manage her failing kidneys.

Miss Maddie was a fighter and a survivor, which is why we let her set the terms. As a puppy, she was found running in the streets, and because of those initial health issues and because she was a skittish puppy, she wasn't the first pick at the shelter. Ken-Mar Rescue in California saved her from euthanasia and put her with a foster. At a year and a half, we were her second (and last) foster family. Maddie was very shy and afraid of most people, especially men. But she loved my husband Lynn and not only snuggled with him willingly (and she's not a snuggle puppy) but gained great delight playing "bite bite" and roughhouse games with him. The co-founder of Ken-Mar Rescue, Martie Petrie, saw how well she had taken to us, so in 2012, Martie waived the adoption fee and gave Maddie to us, and she was ours from that time forward.

In 2017, when Maddie was six years old, she got a foxglove caught in her paw and almost died. But Maddie fought her way back to health. She had lost a bit of her feistiness, and that may have precipitated the progression of her heart issues. But Maddie loved us, loved harassing her fur brothers Panda and Puppet, and loved road trips. Maddie was the BEST road dog and was quite content to be in the car. She loved the floor of the car and even when I tried to hold her or strap her in, she was most happy and content to be on the floor. So Miss Maddie had the opportunity to mark her territory all over California, in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and, of course, Alabama.

This past year, when we knew she was nearing her end, we took our last road trip to Kansas in July to visit Lynn's family. While she still came alive when she was in the car and exhibited some of her usual enjoyment, we knew this would be her last trip, and we would have to make the decision on our return, and thus we did.

We miss her greatly, but now she is healthy once again and frolicking across the Rainbow Bridge with our Tibetan Terrier Panda, who crossed over in 2019, and our first senior dog, Shadow, a Terrier-Poodle mix who passed over in 2011. We are loving on our remaining two: Puppet and Ian. They have also been hanging close, as they sense better than us that our world has changed.

I believe moving to Alabama bought Maddie a bit more time and brought her some renewed life. She got to enjoy the quarter acre of our property, and would often do Zoomies in the grass or explore the perimeter of the property for hours, just happy to explore and be alive.