Man saves dog in dramatic rescue

Well, there I was, all set to write an exciting piece about the problems of peeling celeriac* when a real life drama emerged this morning, another episode for Mercia Mayhem, the soap opera about the boating life in a big marina.

I was on my way up the pontoon this morning and had stopped to chat to Geoff off Black Pearl next door when a small dog, mostly like an undersized King Charles spaniel, came running down Heron pontoon, closely followed by a man who proved to be her owner. She’d obviously escaped from his control and was making a bid for freedom.

Nipping past Geoff and I, she carried on towards the island at the end of Finch, seemingly trapping herself in the dead end at the gate onto the island. Her owner walked towards her, she looked at him and…

...jumped into the water. From there, she swam right round Grebe and into the lagoon between Heron and Ibis. There she swam up and down, defying the mobbing gulls and the threatening Canada Geese, at first wagging her tail as she went. At this point Mr Owner was joined by Mrs, who explained that she was a rescue brood bitch from a puppy farm, they’d only had her five weeks and that she’s very man shy, not to say phobic.

Several of us spent quite some time trying to entice her to come near enough to be rescued, but each time she turned tail and swam off again. Things were looking serious; she was swimming lower in the water and at times rolling over when she tried to turn.

In the end, Gary off the seven dogs boat (it’s got an unpronounceable, Native American name) took off his jacket, put his mobile on top of a bollard and, otherwise fully clothed,  jumped in off the end of a pontoon. He was able to swim up to Gypsy, surround her with his arms and guide her to the end of a finger where I was waiting with a handy long shaft for him to grab.

I fished the dog out and returned her to her mistress whilst others heaved Gary onto the pontoon.

It was a brave act if perhaps foolhardy; after all, the first rule of all rescues is not to endanger yourself in turn. The water in Mercia is very deep, unlike the canals, and is, of course, extremely cold at the moment. On the other hand, Gary was able to complete the rescue without severe distress and the dog would almost certainly have drowned in front of our eyes if he hadn’t done what he did.

What was needed was a small boat to use as a rescue craft, but this is the first time I’ve seen the need for one here; most of the pontoons have an emergency station with a fire extinguisher, a life ring and a rescue ladder which are normally enough to cope with the occasional emergency.

With lots of us available to help with the rescue, Sheila was able to enter journalist mode and take some photos:

Gypsy swimming for freedom

Gary in hot chilled pursuit

Casualty secured

*Peeling celeriac or celery root: accept that you are only going to be able to use about ¾ of what you’ve bought and peel it very thickly, having first cut the top and bottom off to make it stand stably on the chopping board.