Saturday, August 30, 2014

Firefighters sent to rescue runaway guinea pig

A runaway guinea pig was rescued by firefighters in New Zealand on Thursday. Nadine Vasquez, 18, had bought her two guinea pigs Highlight and Munchkin only that morning and let them loose in her Glenfield home on Auckland's North Shore. But Highlight got a fright at around 11am and ran behind the bathroom sink, crawling through a hole in the floor and into the roof void.

Vasquez spent the rest of the day ''panicking'' and trying to lure the runaway out with food. She gave up when it got dark and called the Auckland Council for help - the council sent the Fire Service. Takapuna station officer Mark Neville and his team arrived at about 6.30pm and were able to remove a grid and use a ladder to reach the roof void.



Neville sent in one of the tallest firefighters whose arms were just long enough to scoop up Highlight and return her to Vasquez. He said the guinea pig would otherwise have been trapped in the roof ''forever''. It is unclear who had a more alarming experience, Highlight or Nadine's dad, who came home from work to discover a fire truck in his driveway and firefighters all over the house.

He did not even know his daughter had bought the guinea pigs. Vasquez said she talked to her mum about getting the pets but ''I don't think she took me seriously''. Highlight is now safely back in her cage with Munchkin. Vasquez said she could not imagine leaving Highlight stuck in the roof overnight. ''It's my first guinea pig, I'd like it to grow old and not die on me.''

1 comment:

Bruce Bergman said...

Trust me, once he gets hungry he would have either gotten his way out to the attic crawl hole, or back into the bathroom if it wasn't an insurmountable climb for a guinea pig.

I've had them, and they aren't that stupid.