A “shaken” dog owner who jumped with a friend into a frozen river to rescue her pet has spoken of her gratitude for the “hero” passer-by who helped with the rescue.
Dyce resident Debbie Richmond was walking Lemmy along the Donside path towards Stoneywood with friend Susan Liebnitz when the pug-cross sprinted excitedly onto the ice.
“I let him off the lead and he ran off down the bank – but he just kept on running over the ice – he was so excited,” she said.
“It happened so quickly, I had no time to get him back – when the ice got too thin he fell through.”
Immediately plunging into the icy waters to save her pooch, Mrs Richmond, 37 of Princess Drive, said she then started to try to break the ice in order to get nearer to the hole where Lemmy was stuck.
“He couldn’t hold himself up,” said Mrs Richmond.
“He is the most precious thing to me. Susan jumped in as well, but we couldn’t reach him.”
Paul Gray, 39, was also out walking his dog and ran over when he heard the friends’ “huge screams”.
He said: “When I got close enough, I could see the two women in the river – they were both in up to their necks.
“They were both screaming hysterically. I told them to keep calm and to get out straight away – but they were trying to break the ice to get to the dog.
“The dog had walked across the ice and was in the water, in a circular hole. They were about four or five metres away from it.
“I ran and pulled a branch off a tree and tried to get the dog to take hold of it – I thought if it got it in its teeth, then I could pull it out.
“We managed to coax it and got it onto the ice, but then it fell in again – the two women were crying and totally hysterical.
“I was more worried about them and getting them out of the water – they were in so deep, but still standing on the ground.”
After a few minutes, Lemmy was coaxed out and was firmly back on dry land.
The women told Mr Gray that they didn’t live too far away and so declined his offer of shelter at his Stoneywood home.
He said: “I offered them my coat, but they said they would be fine and would walk home – I’m just glad that they are all ok.”
Last night Motorhead fan Mrs Richmond said she was still quite shaken by whole incident but “so grateful” to Mr Gray for his quick thinking in helping save her two-year-old dog.
“I’d like to send him the biggest thank you, it could have been so much worse,” she said.
“I’ll be keeping Lemmy on a lead from now on.”
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