Saved by a whisker! Tiny kitten rescued from Covid-19 hospital pipe after patients hear pleading meows coming from under the floor

A kitten in Russia's Ural region has had a lucky escape that left all nine of its lives intact thanks to coronavirus patients who sounded the alarm when the adventurous baby cat became stuck in a network of pipes under a clinic.

On Monday, animal rescue volunteers in Ekaterinburg, the country's fourth largest city, issued a statement in which they revealed how the plucky furball avoided an untimely demise. The group took the call from officials at the 36th Trauma Hospital, which has been converted to treat Covid-19 patients, after a member of the public heard determined meowing throughout the day.

While at first no one could locate where the kitten's calls for help were coming from, a fast-thinking doctor got hold of an endoscope camera – usually used for imaging inside patients’ bodies – in order to look into the bowels of the building.

Guided by the fibre optics, one brave rescuer who went in after the cat recounted how “I crawled up to the bend in the pipe, creeping and holding onto the screws sticking out of the walls. When I got to the turn and peeped through, I saw a kitten trying to climb the smooth tin wall and put it in my bag.”

According to the volunteer, “the kitten was very small, hypothermic and soaking wet from water that had accumulated in the bottom of the pipe...leaving him here would mean abandoning him to his death.”

In the end, the group added, “the kitten was taken in for nursing by an old friend of ours who luckily lives in the area.” It's not clear whether the tiny cat will have to self-isolate after his time scurrying around the coronavirus clinic.

In May, emergency workers in Moscow launched a rescue operation to save a duckling from having been swept into a storm drain. Thankfully, fire crews were able to unite the bird with its mother before it came to a fowl end.

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