Firefighters rescue girl’s puppy trapped in well
Published: July 6, 2007
Mickey the beagle is one lucky puppy thanks to the New London Volunteer Fire Department.
Early last week, the Costello family of Cropwell brought home two new beagle puppies.
“Catherine was turning 6, so we got her Mickey,” John Costello said. “We got Miley, Mickey’s half-sister, for John Bennett and Caroline.”
Two days after the puppies arrived, John Costello got up to get ready for work. He let both puppies outside to play while he got them fresh food and water.
“I looked back and could only see Baron, our cat, and Miley,” Costello said. “Mickey was nowhere in sight. I thought he might have gone around our old pump house because I could hear him, just not see him.”
Beside the old pump house is a well about 6 inches wide and between 10 and 15 feet deep. Mickey had fallen down the well and was stuck.
“I knew something was wrong because Miley was sitting off to the side going nuts and howling,” Costello said.
He ran and grabbed a flashlight to take a closer look. Fortunately Mickey had landed with his head up. Costello ran inside and woke his wife, Holly, who ran outside while he called 9-1-1.
“The operator told me she alerted the Fire Department,” Costello said. “I went back outside, and Holly and I tried to rig up a device with our pool cleaning pole.”
They spent the next 20 minutes trying to pull the puppy up without success. Then volunteers from the New London Volunteer Fire Department began to arrive.
Fire Chief Robert Muller, Donna Muller, Amanda Ray, Kathy Henry and Kandi Margargee arrived on the scene.
“When we got the call, I had to double check my beeper to see if I had the message right,” Robert Muller said. “‘Puppy stuck in well’ is something you don’t see often.”
“At first we thought it was a large well,” Henry said. “We were going to send Amanda down a ladder to get the puppy. Then we saw the well was only about 6 inches wide.”
The volunteer firefighters had brought a strong rope with them. With the help of the Costellos’ vacuum cleaner, they rigged a noose and attached it to the pool cleaning pole.
“Rigging the rope was the longest part of the rescue,” Robert Muller said. “We had to cut down a tree limb above the well to make room for the pole.”
Ray and Margargee lowered the rescue device and managed to get it looped around Mickey. They told Costello and Robert Muller to pull and lifted Mickey out of the hole.
“It only took about 5 to 10 seconds to lift him out of the hole,” Costello said. “But it sure felt like 10 years.”
Margargee, who is a nurse at St. Clair County Regional Hospital, checked over Mickey and pronounced him fine. Catherine, who had been watching from the kitchen window, ran outside and got Mickey. She wrapped him in a towel and looked after him.
“A puppy is special,” Ray said. “To see the look on Catherine’s face when she got to hold her puppy just made my day. Anytime a child is involved, we want to do everything we can.”
“The firefighters were just great,” Holly Costello said. “We knew once they got here that they weren’t leaving without rescuing Mickey.”
“We want to give a huge thank you to all those volunteers who came out and rescued Mickey,” Costello said. “I was dreading having to tell Catherine that something had happened to her birthday puppy. Thanks to them, I didn’t have to do that.”
Catherine was happy to get her puppy back safe and sound. “I want to be a pet doctor when I grow up,” she said.
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