When a Massachusetts dog started choking, her owner made a split-second decision to rush her to the Palmer Fire Department. That move probably saved the animal's life.
Stella, an older chihuahua who can't walk, began choking frantically on slices of cucumber Wednesday.
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Her owner, Tammy Johnson, got her vet on the phone, but was told there was no way a doctor could get to them in time.
Johnson jumped in the car with Stella and made the two-mile drive to the fire station, where a firefighter Pat Jesop, who had special animal rescue training, happened to be on duty.
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"Luckily, Pat was there and let us in," Johnson said. "And he helped us."
"We're trained on so many different things that you fall back on what you remember from those trainings, and I'm lucky enough that I took it and I remembered it," Jesop said.
"He was calm. We were not," Johnson recalled.
Jesop took Basic Animal Rescue Training, or BART, 10 years ago. He used it for the first time Wednesday.
