Child rescued by dog

Press, 3 October 1983, Page 8

Child rescued by dog

PA Auckland A three-quarter-grown Labrador pup saved a toddler from drowning in Western Springs Lake on Saturday when it answered its master’s command to “fetch.”

The seven-month-old pup, Jet, did not hesitate when Justin McAuliffe, aged 11, yelled his command as he saw his niece, Rebecca Komene, disappearing beneath the water.

“I was going to jump in after Rebecca, but before I could do anything Jet leapt from the bank and grabbed her by her skivvy, then dragged her out of the water,” Justin said. “I heard this bubbling sort of noise, and Rebecca’s head disappeared twice before Jet reached her.

“I got down on my stomach by the edge of the lake and dragged her out when

Jet dragged her to me,” said Justin. Justin and Rebecca had been playing at the grassed area near the lake. “Rebecca wanted to wash her gumboots, and she slipped off a rock into the water,” said Justin.

The water where she fell was well over her head.

“I thought she was going to drown,” he said.

A passer-by took Rebecca, shivering and tearful, to the house of the caretaker of the Museum of Transport and Technology, which borders the lake. There her clothes were dried and her parents telephoned. “I was very scared,” said Rebecca, warm and dry once more after her ordeal.

"Jet is very strong, but sometimes when you yell ‘Fetch’ he runs the wrong way.”