Salem Fire Protection District firemen used a thermal imaging camera Monday afternoon to help locate and free a cat following a 16 foot fall down a fireplace flue.
Salem Fire Chief Dave Duncan says the cat was not hurt and didn’t even appear scared about its predicament when regaining its freedom.
Firemen were called to the home in the 400 block of South Castle by a couple that recently bought the home and was in the process of remodeling it. They feared their cat had fallen in between walls of the home from an open cavity around the flue on the floor of the attic. Firemen could hear the cat and eventually were able to look down the flue to confirm that’s where the cat had fallen and became stuck.
With a general idea of the cat’s location, the thermal imaging camera was used to detect the cat’s body heat more precisely. Hand and air chisels and a hammer were then used to take out the mortar and remove a few bricks to allow the cat to walk out of where it had been trapped.
It is believed the cat fell 16 feet down the flue around eight Monday morning. Firemen mounted a crew to try and locate the cat with the thermal imaging camera around 12:30. It took about two and a half hours to set the cat free.
