Firefighters from the City of Cape Town have been hailed as heroes after going above and beyond the call of duty to save a kitten from Lentegeur.
The incident on 12 January just after 10pm saw firefighters rescue the katjie from an eight-metre tall tree in Hydrangea Street.
Kim Manuel, 36, says that she got a groot skrik to find her three-month-old fur baby Jackson “JJ” Junior stuck in the tree.
Kim says: “I wasn’t worried when I didn’t see him for a while, but then I realised that the cat was in the tree and like eight metres up I was really scared because how were we going to get the cat out. I was really scared at that time. What if my cat was going to be stuck there all night, not eating.”
Kim claimed that she was left with no choice but to call the fire brigade to help get her cat from the tree.
She says: “By 10.45pm, a huge fire truck pulled up in front of my home and the rescue mission began.”
However, the rescue mission wasn’t that easy as it was too risky to put up the ladder and have one of the firemen retrieve the cat due to where the tree was situated.
The officer in charge then decided to gently hose Jackson out of the tree, while gradually increasing pressure.
Kim recalls: “I was stressed like a mother would be when a child fell from a tree and broke their arm. I didn’t care that I was drenched in water. I just wanted my cat down.”
After a few minutes of hosing, Jackson just hopped down from branch to branch until he was within reach of a neighbour to get up on the vibracrete and grab him from the lower branches.
City Fire and Rescue Services spokesperson Jermaine Carelse says the kitten was reunited with his owner after 11pm.
Carelse says: “The fire crew from Ottery Fire Station attended to the scene and by 11.10pm the cat was safely in the owner’s possession.”