A beloved Basset Hound has been found alive after a week lost in the freezing streets of Edmonton in Alberta, Canada.
As reported by CTV, the 15-month-old dog, named Gus, wandered outside of his home into bitterly cold temperatures.
When his owner, Teresa Nisperos, realized the dog had escaped, she went after him while barefoot.
“Knowing that he’s never been outside, and he’s not used to seeing a lot of people or even other dogs, my heart just basically sank. And I’m like, ‘Oh my God, the immediate thought was, ‘Is he gonna get hit? Is he gonna get stolen? What about the cold?’ I was just devastated immediately,” she told the network.
Nisperos, who is an immunocompromised cancer survivor, put out a call on Facebook for help finding Gus after he had been missing for about 12 hours.
Neighbors mobilized for Nisperos, and there were some sightings of the dog, but the search was ultimately fruitless. So Gus’ owner put out a second plea for help on the sixth day her pet was missing.
After a week, Gus was spotted in a rural area, and Nisperos traveled to where he was to lure him to her safe arms.
“We are from the Philippines, so we don’t have family over here, and having everyone rally around and behind us finding Gus felt like we had our families from back home here in Canada,” Nisperos told CTV.
Gus was taken to the vet to be evaluated after his ordeal. Nisperos said he has lesions on his nose, but otherwise his medical team was surprised that he fared as well as he did after spending a week in the cold.
