A 12-year-old German shepherd in the US state of Missouri is lucky to be alive after being buried in a sinkhole for 72 hours. The hunt for Maverick started on February 4 after he wandered from his home in Parkville, north of Kansas City. “He had on his invisible fence collar,” said owner lisa Van Valkenburgh.
One day while Van Valkenburgh was walking outside her home she heard a faint howl coming from under the ground. At first, she thought her dog was in the ditch below, stuck in a drain pipe. “I jumped down frantically searching,” she said. “A man stopped to help me when he saw a sinkhole at the side of the road.” Her dog was buried alive.
Van Valkenburgh’s son and husband came to try to dig the dog out, but Maverick was sucked into the mud and very weak. The family then called rescue authorities for help. It took rescue crews almost two hours to dig Maverick out. “They had to dig out under Maverick to release the suction the clay had on him,” she said. Once he was rescued, the pooch was lifeless and had to be rushed to the emergency vet hospital.