The single dad told us that the day had started out like any other.
“I was having a coffee watching the morning news, and my son was in the shower getting ready for school,” Dwayne said.
“Suddenly my son smelled something odd, and in a matter of seconds he saw the bedroom was glowing. He jumped out of the shower and yelled out to me, and as soon as I saw what was happening I put my arms around him and we ran with just the clothes on our back. The house went up so quick. The pressure, the panic, the intensity of the smoke was so intense, there wasn’t time to think or act.”
Dwayne suffered minor burns, but his thoughts were only with his beloved cats who were still trapped inside. He and his son were distraught thinking that Smokey and Boo, who they had rescued and bottle fed as stray kittens, had not made it. Smokey was a support animal to Dwayne's son, and meant the absolute world to him.
Fearing the worst, they returned the next day to the wreckage. And after more than an hour of searching, they were amazed to find Smokey and Boo under the rubble - alive.
"I couldn't believe it," Dwayne said. "The ceiling had collapsed on top of Boo, and he was underneath it in the sink, badly burned but still alive. When I lifted the rubble away he let out a little meow as if saying 'Daddy, I'm hurt'. His paws, ears and whiskers were all burned. We found Smokey later under the bonnet of my car. The little fellas deserved to live, so we took them straight to the vet.”
Dwayne didn't care that he didn't have much left. He told himself that if by chance the cats were still alive, he would do all that he could to give them a fighting chance.
When we heard of their plight, we knew that we had to step in to help with the emergency vet care that Smokey and Boo so urgently needed.
Smokey was suffering from smoke inhalation and came out relatively unscathed, but sadly the same could not be said for Boo. The sweet young cat was critical, and required urgent treatment for severe third-degree burns to his paws over the week that followed.
Dear Boo was back with his favourite human, but he needed to return to the vet every second day to have his bandages changed - a procedure which required him to be anaesthetised due to the pain, costing $500 per visit. As a result, the vet fees blew out to much more than the $1,000 that we were able to cover for emergencies.
As soon as we put the callout to our wonderful community to help raise $6,000 to help get Boo back on his paws, they rallied.
Not only did the donations cover the extensive vet costs, they also helped to cover temporary pet-friendly accommodation for three weeks so that the family could be together while they worked out their next steps.
Dwayne was incredibly grateful to Pets Of The Homeless and the community for supporting them.
"I can't express how much it means to us," he said.
