Thanks to some fast work by Kansas firefighters, a feline escaped a frozen death.
A black cat was stranded in the Arkansas River in downtown Wichita on Thursday, The Wichita Eagle reported.
“When we got there, there’s a cat out in the middle of the river sitting on some ice,” Wichita Fire Lt. Kenneth Ast said.
A rescue team inflated a boat and headed toward the animal. They were just in time.
The ice “was starting to crack right when they got to the cat,” Fire Capt. Neko McBee told the Eagle.
The cat was unable to move because it was injured.
“It appears someone has thrown this cat from the overpass and his back legs are broken or dislocated,” a post on the Beauties and Beasts Inc. Facebook page said early Thursday evening. “Please help us save his life.”
How the cat got on the river remains a mystery.
“I know the cat was not in good shape,” McBee said.
Beauties and Beasts, an animal rescue group, posted Thursday that the cat, whom they named “River,” had a broken right rear leg. X-rays were being done to see if River’s pelvis was broken or damaged and to see if there are other broken bones.
“His poor pads were peeling off and nails extremely short on the front and missing some on the rear, maybe from clawing in a panic unable to move,” the group’s Facebook post said.
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