1yo saved via cat flap
Published: January 19, 2006
It will be something to laugh about in a few years time.
For now though, Lisa Lockwood is just happy that her daughter Ruby is safe and sound - after the one-year-old locked her out of their Norfolk home and had to be rescued by firefighters . . . via the cat flap.
The drama began as the bright toddler was happily playing at her Marauder Road home at Old Catton, near Norwich, yesterday morning, and Ms Lockwood started to get ready to go out.
“I wanted to quickly nip and put the car seat back in my car because I had taken it out and used it in a friend’s car the day before,” said Ms Lockwood, 33.
“I made sure all the other doors were locked and left Ruby in the kitchen but when I tried to come back in through the side door I couldn’t open it. I could see her sitting on the floor and thought she was just in the way but then I realised she must have turned the lock.”
Luckily, Ms Lockwood had her mobile phone in her pocket and called the fire service, as well as her partner Peter Morgan, who was at work at Lotus.
“I could see her through the glass at first but then she went off and I was in a panic,” she said.
A fire crew from Sprowston arrived at the scene and started looking for ways to get in.
“The firefighters were very professional and told me not to panic and that everything would be OK,” added Ms Lockwood.
“They were talking about taking one of the windows out, but luckily they thought she was small enough to fit through the cat flap.”
After taking the plastic cover off it was then a case of trying to coax Ruby through.
“We tried to make it into a game but she kept wanting me to pick her up and couldn’t see that she had to come through the cat flap. I was in floods of tears.
“Then her dad came home from work and he managed to get her through.”
The family was reunited with Ruby none the worse for her adventure and willing to demonstrate exactly how she managed to turn the lock - thankfully with her mum inside this time.
Ms Lockwood praised the firefighters: “I’m certainly not going to leave her on her own again and I’m going to make sure the neighbours and friends have plenty of sets of spare keys,” she said.
Martin Barsby, Norfolk Fire Service spokesman, said: “Firefighters have a varied job and deal with many incidents and they never know quite what to expect when the fire bell rings but this is certainly one of the more unusual rescues.”
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