Dog believed drowned in Thompson River found living under boat

A dog believed drowned in Kamloops, B.C.'s Thompson River returned home last week in a recovery being described as something of a miracle.

Sammie-Marie, a two-year-old Boston terrier cross, had just been adopted by Joshua Knaak and his partner on Jan. 11 when she escaped out his front door as he was returning home from work.

"She was pretty skittish, and probably pretty nervous about the change," Knaak told Daybreak Kamloops host Shelley Joyce. "It was one of the worst feelings in the world seeing her take off."

Sammie-Marie was spotted at McArthur Island Park along the Thompson River later that night, but Knaak said no one was able to get close enough to grab her and bring her to safety.

The following day, Knaak received news that made his heart drop.

Sammie-Marie had once again been seen along the river but was spooked by a passing vehicle.

She then ran out onto the frozen river and vanished from sight.

"You could see the tracks," Knaak said. "They went about halfway out the river and disappeared."

While frozen on top, the moving water of the Thompson River combined with temperatures near 0 C meant it would be easy for Sammy-Marie to fall through the ice, and also prevented Knaak from investigating further. Instead, he had to wait for further sightings — and, when none came, he had to assume she was gone.

Then, exactly two weeks after Sammy-Marie first disappeared, Knaak received an unexpected phone call from the city's community services line.

"They said, 'We think we have your dog.'" 

Hiding under a boat

Rachel Meixner of Kamloops' community service office said her team had received a phone call from a resident who found a dog, skinny and scared, living under a boat.

It took a lot of coaxing but eventually they got her out and brought her back to the office.

Though there was no licence or tattoos, Meixner said one of her staff members recognized Sammy-Marie from Knaak's posts on social media, so they contacted him to come down to see if was indeed his missing dog.

"I didn't want to get my hopes up," Knaak said. "[But] we recognized her right away and she recognized us."

Meixner called the dog's recovery a "miracle" and said it was hard to control her emotions when Sammie-Marie and Knaak were reunited.

"I had to hide my face," she said. "It was amazing ... You do a diversity of work, but it's not always this nice."

Sammie-Marie was emaciated, having gone from 26 pounds down to 14, and needed several trips to a local vet to recover.

But, Knaak said, she is feeling much better and has fully embraced living in her new home.

"She's a little cuddlebug now," he said.