JOPPATOWNE, Md. — When firefighters arrived at the undisclosed home in Joppatowne, the small terrier named ‘Highway’ had taken a detour into the bowels of a recliner and no one could get him out.
“I ain’t never heard of a dog stuck in a recliner,” said Marcus Byrd of Baltimore.
“My first thought was, ‘Awh, poor baby’,” said Brandi Hawkins, “It must be terrified so…”
Fire officials aren’t commenting on how the dog got caught up in a piece of furniture, but some say it’s not that far ‘fetched’.
“I mean if the dog was behind the pillow or something and the children are playing and they wind up hitting the button and not knowing that the dog is there and run off playing. You know how children play,” said Byrd, “Yes, it’s possible. It can happen.”
Faced with a small canine virtually encased in springs and the recliner’s frame, firefighters used the jaws of life, a heavy-duty hydraulic tool, to free him.
“Does in surprise you that they would go to such lengths to get the Jaws of Life out to save it?” we asked.
“No,” said Byrd, “because it was a life that needed to be saved whether it was a human or a dog, it was a life that really needed to be, you know, that they had to rescue. Yes, I agree that that was a good move.”
“The Jaws of Life are used for extreme measures,” added Hawkins, “so this was obviously extreme to the owner and very upsetting, I’m sure.”
