Connie had been caught within the container with out meals and water for not less than every week, in line with the Coast Guard.
Deoudes, the founding father of the Maryland-based Forever Changed Animal Rescue, figured affords to assist Connie can be flooding in after the Coast Guard’s now-viral rescue posts. But she and her colleagues nonetheless tried, and on Tuesday, Connie arrived by aircraft to Virginia, the place she is now staying with Deoudes.
Now, her purpose is to search out Connie a secure home within the D.C. space.
“I thought, ‘What a survivor to make it through all of that,’” stated Deoudes, who additionally works as a veterinarian.
Staff handled Connie like a celeb when she arrived at Deoudes’s workplace Tuesday. Everyone needed to greet the “Container Dog” and snap images together with her.
During an preliminary examination, Deoudes discovered that Connie’s thick fur coat had hidden her malnourishment. There was one other shock, too: An ultrasound revealed that the canine was pregnant.
“While it seems like a really happy thing, it’s also tough because let’s say she has five puppies — those are five dogs that will be adopted into homes,” Deoudes stated. “And there’s already five puppies alive somewhere else that may be euthanized because they’re not going to be get adopted.”
Coast Guard Petty Officer third Class Jose Reyes, who helped rescue Connie, stated the canine’s barking would possibly’ve saved her from being shipped abroad.
He and three different Coast Guard members occurred to listen to her throughout a routine inspection. Normally, they might have skipped that part of the Houston-area terminal, however automobile hassle prompted them to cease close to Connie’s container, Reyes stated. As quickly as they stopped, Reyes and his colleagues heard barking.
Minutes handed, and the barks continued. The Coasties frantically tried to search out the supply, Reyes recalled. Finally, realizing the one course they hadn’t seemed was up, they decided the noise was coming from a container stacked about 25 ft within the air.
The container was certain for Dubai, he stated.
“That was our moment of ‘Oh no, we should probably do something about this,’” Reyes stated.
The Coast Guard members alerted port officers, who introduced in a crane to begin transferring containers. When the container with the canine was lowered, the barking acquired louder together with the sound of scratching in opposition to steel. When the container door was opened, Connie’s nostril poked out.
“She walked out on her own immediately,” Reyes stated. “She was very, very happy to see all of us.”
The transport container was filled with totaled automobiles and automobile components, Chief Petty Officer Corinne Zilnicki, a Coast Guard spokeswoman, stated in an announcement. It’s not clear how Connie ended up within the container, Zilnicki stated, including that she might have been dwelling in a junkyard and was by chance loaded into the container.
On the way in which to an animal shelter in Pasadena, Tex., after the rescue, Reyes stated Connie was in somebody’s lap the entire experience.
“She just wanted to be pet the entire time,” he stated.
Johana Murillo, the assistant supervisor of the Pasadena Animal Shelter, stated Connie had no microchip and wanted to be handled for heartworm. They gave her vaccinations and flea- and tick-prevention medicine however realized she required extra care, Murillo stated.
That similar day, the Pasadena Animal Shelter acquired an e-mail from Deoudes’s colleague providing to look after Connie. The Texas shelter shortly agreed and Connie was flown out to Virginia on Tuesday.
Forever Changed Animal Rescue will look after Connie till her heartworm therapy is full and he or she offers start to her litter, which will even be carefully monitored within the coming weeks. Then the dogs will all be put up for adoption within the DMV, barring main well being considerations.
“We know we will find her an amazing home,” Deoudes stated. “It’s going to be tough because we’re going to receive a million applications.”
