Miracle cat survives 40-mile car journey trapped in vehicle's engine space
A cat that vanished from its home was found miraculously alive 40 miles away... behind a car’s radiator grill.
Terrified Charlie, a five-year-old tabby, was stuck for an hour in the motor after he crept out of his house and climbed inside it. His owner Laura Carroll, 40, was left worried when she first noticed him missing from their home in Sunderland, Tyne and Wear. But later, the pet was found trapped in a care home nurse’s car, who had driven from near her address to Warkworth, Northumberland, for work.
Staff at the old people’s residence, who discovered the cat, spent more than an hour trying to retrieve him before handing him over to a local rescue centre. Mum-of-three Laura said: “He is a house cat so doesn’t go outside much or for long periods of time. I did think he might just come back later on the day, but the kids were really worried.
“As soon as I saw the ‘found’ photo I knew straight away it was him. And to see he had been found in Northumberland was unbelievable. I think he must have escaped out of an open window. I have no idea how he managed to get into the car, and we will be getting him chipped now. He’s a very friendly and affectionate cat so would probably go to anyone.”
Charlie is now back at home (Laura Carroll / SWNS)Laura, who works in admin, had put up posters and made social media appeals in the hopes that someone living close to them might find him. But the moggy had in fact found his way into a local resident’s car, who then drove for an hour to The Grange Nursing Home, in Warkworth, Morpeth, where they work.
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Kelly Stavers, 47, a housekeeper at the home, said she was one of the first to spot the scared moggy poking out from the grille of her colleague’s vehicle. She said: “He’s just an agency staff member and doesn’t come very often, so we didn’t know whose car it was to start with.
“But he was obviously distraught to see where the cat was. I don’t know how he managed to get in there. We couldn’t fathom it. It was just so strange. We thought we were going to have to pull the car to bits to get it out. I got some ham out of the kitchen to try and entice him to come out. Eventually, we had to take the battery out of the car to get him out. It took an hour and 20 minutes..”
Kelly said staff reached out JJ’S Cat and Kitten Rescue, which saves abandoned moggies, and they had agreed to take him in and search for his owner. Joanne Stewart, 50, who volunteers at the centre, said they had scanned Charlie for a microchip but put up a Facebook appeal for his owners when they found none.
She said: “We took him in and made him comfortable. He was very, very dirty. But he was very, very friendly. He was obviously someone’s pet.“ Despite his ordeal, Charlie wasn’t fazed at all: "I put him in a crate with a bed and some food, and I left him with my husband in our living room and he watched the English football match.
“But as soon as his owners told us his name, he responded to it straight away. We obviously had to confirm it was their cat, using photos to establish it was him.”
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