Dyersburg pet oxygen mask saves family dog

DYERSBURG, Tenn. — Emergency responders say their first time using a pet oxygen mask likely saved a family dog’s life.

“We was asleep, and I couldn’t breath and got up and my house was on fire,” pet owner Teresa Henson said.

She says she lost everything in a devastating house fire this past Wednesday — almost everything.

“The main thing was to get out of the house with our lives, and then I look at it like this — my dog was taken care of,” Henson said.

Teresa said as soon as she noticed her bedroom in flames, she and her boyfriend immediately ran out of the house, only to realize that her little dog Coco was still inside.

After a firefighter discovered the pooch, EMT Scotty Hollis said he was able to help Coco breathe using the Dyersburg Fire Department’s new pet oxygen mask.

“He was breathing on his own, but he needed some air,” Hollis said. “So I went ahead and put him on oxygen, and we kept him on there for about 10 to 15 minutes, and he came around pretty good.”

Scotty said, given the circumstances, Coco was lucky the mask was available.

“Being that hour of the night, if we had not been able to give him oxygen with the new pet mask, he could have had some damage being that our pet hospitals are not open,” Hollis said. “He could have died.”

But instead, Coco lives to play another day.

The Dyersburg Fire Department received the pet oxygen mask from an anonymous donor in December, and they consider this first time using it to be a success.