Duck falls down chimney into roaring fire and lives to tell the tale

A mother-of-two was left stunned when a duck fell down her chimney onto a roaring fire - and miraculously escaped unharmed. The clumsy mallard appeared from a cloud of soot as Helen Marsh was watching TV in her home in Solihull, West Midlands. The duck had been roosting on the family's chimney stack - and somehow lost his balance and fell straight down the narrow chimney. Incredibly, he escaped with only singed tail feathers - despite landing on a burning fire.



However, Ms Marsh has been forced to completely redecorate her home after the duck got into such a flap he covered her sofas and carpet in the soot. The 47-year-old sales accountant said: 'I've never seen anything so bizarre in my life. We tried to catch the duck and get it out of the living room, but our dog, was going crazy - and the duck was flapping more and more soot all over the place.

'My children were thrilled that we had a duck in the house - but I tried to keep them out of the room so the duck didn't get more stressed out.' Ms Marsh eventually managed to get the duck into the porch - where she left him with a bucket of water while she called RSPCA officers - who promptly took the confused bird to be checked over. She added: 'I put the duck in the porch with a bucket of water, thinking it would calm down.



'It must have got a small cut when it came down the chimney, because when I went back into the porch, it looked like a murder scene. The duck was flying around trying to escape through the glass, and there was soot and blood everywhere. Fortunately, the RSPCA turned up very quickly, and were very nice.' The duck - which officers nicknamed Sooty - has been taken to the Wychbold Swan rescue centre while his singed feathers grow back. He will then be released back into the wild.