Scattered Cats Rescued From Rising Waters From Birkirkara Vets
As the army was called in to rescue stranded drivers and passengers around the island, veterinary nurses were on the streets rescuing cats from a potentially tragic fate.
“We saw a woman sitting on our steps, bending over and looking, and then a customer came in and told us ‘a cat was hit by a car’,” a veterinary nurse working at AnimalPharm told Lovin Malta.
“We went outside and the woman told us that she was trying to contact Animal Welfare as the cat was hidden under a car. I removed the scarf and dragged it under the car, stripped it and dragged it out and took it to the living room immediately and started working. ”
The cat, who was shivering and terrified, underwent some tests to allow veterinarians to see what happened.
“We took his temperature – it was obviously hypothermic – and he was traumatized and in shock.”
Veterinarians found he had exposed bone and abrasions all over his body, and was wet. Frightened after being hit by a car, the cat tried to hide under a car, but crashed as fast-moving waters rose around it.
“We wrapped him in a vet’s blanket and put several bottles of hot water in an attempt to bring him to the temperature, and we gave him because he was starving.”
Veterinarians scanned it and found it was microchipped, but it was not registered to an owner, so they determined it was lost.
Animal Welfare has since caught the cat – but AnimalPharm vets have kept its case number and intend to follow up in a few days to make sure it is on the road to recovery.
It wasn’t just cats that were rescued by good Samaritans around Malta – a driver got wet as he helped the Malta Animal Commissioner who was stuck in her car, and people were rescued by the army as soon as they found themselves stranded.
Share this story to give a shout out to the vets who crawled under a car in the heavy rain to save a lost cat