It was a quiet day at Navy House Village in Sattahip on March 11, 2020, when all of a sudden, a resident saw a white poodle chase a rat across the street at top speed.
The chase was fast and furious, but the rat being small and nimble got away and jumped into a drain by the side of the road. The 14 year-old poodle named ‘San’ didn’t like to lose a chase, so he too jumped in right after the rodent.
Having jumped onto the hole, San realized that it was mistake. The round drain pipe was a tiny one into which his medium sized canine body could hardly fit. But it was too late. He had gone in too far and there was not enough room for him to turn around and come back.
All he could do was cry.
His master Prasong Preamsatien, 56 heard his desperate cry for help, but was helpless and didn’t know what to do. He called his neighbor Suchart Ploduk 55, who came out as fast as he could to see what the commotion was about. Having considered the critical nature of situation, they decided that they would call the local rescue unit and request for their urgent help.
In the meantime, ‘San’s’ cry for help became weaker and weaker. He was running out of air and it was getting harder for him to breathe.
The rescue unit had not arrived and the worry was if they waited any longer, they would lose ‘San’ for sure. There was no time to lose.
Right there and then, Suchat made the daring decision to rescue the dog himself. He grabbed a crow bar and pried open the steel grate covering the drain. He crawled down the opening and immediately felt that there was not enough air to breathe, even at just a meter down. It was even worse for ‘San’ in the drain who had almost no air at all.
Quick thinking, Suchat asked for three fans to be brought to the opening quickly. He placed the big one on top of the opening blowing air down into the hole and the two smaller ones were place below blowing air into the drain where ‘San’ was wedged in.
Now at least San was getting some air. The next step was to get San out of there. Again Suchat thought, “There’s no one else here, I’ll just have to do it myself”.
He lowered himself into the hole and crawled head first into the tiny drain. Everyone held their breaths and prayed silently.
It seemed almost like an eternity and still there was no movement. After a long while they saw Suchat wriggle his legs as he crawled backwards to try to get out of the drain. “Did he find San? Does he have San? Is he hurt? Is he alive?
Suchat emerged out of the hole with a big grin on his face. In his arms he held the muddy, shivering and frightened poodle. San seemed shaken, but he was alive and had survived the near-death ordeal.
The neighbours breathed a sigh of relief and clapped as San was handed back to Prasong, San’s master.
As the excitement of the real-life drama subsided, everyone walked slowly back to their homes, San was whisked away and placed under a garden hose where he got the bath of his life.
