Disabled dog survives five nights in the Minnesota snow

Facebook / Emily Raguse

With freezing temperatures blowing across the U.S. this winter, reports of tragic accidents—and even deaths—have been pervasive. However, one story of a disabled dog who survived five days in icy temperatures is melting hearts all over the internet.

Buddy, a 13-year-old Goldendoodle from Eden Prairie, Minnesota, has had his share of challenges. He is blind, and is also battling cancer. So when his owner, Patsy Sumpter, put him outside on a Wednesday evening and he didn’t return, she feared the worst.

“Normally he goes down in the woods and he comes back,” she told KARE-11. “And he didn’t come back. And I kept calling and calling.”

According to Sumpter, the weather in her eastern Minnesota town deteriorated as she searched for her missing pup over the next few days.

“The weather changed and it snowed that next morning and it just got worse and worse, and I just felt so helpless,” she said.

As Sumpter continued to call and look for Buddy, her neighbor, Emily Raguse, returned home from a weekend trip away. And while Raguse rarely entered the spare bedroom in the basement of her home, she tell reporters that some unknown force—what Raguse calls “divine intervention”—prompted her to go down there that Monday, January 15.

“I had gone downstairs to switch out loads of laundry and for some reason, only which can be attributed to God, I just happened to look into our spare bedroom,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “This poor pup moved his head just enough for me to see him.”

“I don’t know why I looked in the spare bedroom, I really have no idea,” she told KARE-11. “He was really, really lethargic, so he pretty much was only moving his head a little bit,” she said. “I grabbed a towel from the house to put on top of him because he was obviously cold. He was shivering.”

While few people would expect that a blind, elderly dog would be able to survive in snowy Minnesota winter weather, Sumpter said she had prayed and hoped for his return. And after Buddy’s name and owner info was discovered on his collar, he was soon reunited with his family.

“I prayed and prayed and it’s just so miraculous that they found him,” she said. “I don’t think he would have made it one more night.”

Since his miraculous recovery, Buddy has been spending his nights near the family’s warm fireplace.

“He didn’t want to die there I guess,” said his owner. “He wanted to come home and be with us.”

And we’re so relieved that he made it. Tell us: Do you let your dog out in the cold weather?

Animals, Good News, News

About the Author
Margeaux Baulch Klein
Margeaux Baulch Klein is a freelance writer and digital strategist based in Los Angeles. She has written for publications like the Huffington Post, New York Daily News, Bustle, and HelloGiggles, among others.

From our partners