On
the morning of 4 August, 1998, Jo Ann Altsman suffered a heart attack while
vacationing in the north woods of Presque Isle, Pennsylvania, USA. Alone1,
apart from the family dog Bear (who did nothing but bark at Jo
Ann after she collapsed and tried to summon help by breaking a bedroom window
of the mobile home), she lay on the floor yelling:
Somebody
help me! Please help me! Call an ambulance!
Jo Ann, who had had a
heart attack just 18 months earlier, was panic stricken. Another member of the
Altsman 'family' was at hand though. LuLu, a housebroken Vietnamese Pot-Bellied Pig came to Jo Ann's aid. The pig was
bought as a 40th birthday present for the Altsmans' daughter, Jackie, a year
earlier. Going whale-watching for her birthday, Jackie asked her
parents to babysit LuLu until she returned. It became apparent over the next
few months that Jackie didn't really want LuLu, remarking to her parents she'd
pick up her new pet:
Next
weekend, next weekend.
The Altsmans soon became attached to LuLu, even as the piglet gained
weight from a smallish 4 pounds to a more porcine 150. It was lucky however,
that Jack and Jo Ann Altsman chose to keep the animal.
The Rescue Pig
LuLu took one look at
Jo Ann and after 'crying2' for a moment, crashed through the
doggy/piggy door of the mobile home and into the fenced-in yard. Lulu had never
left the confines of the yard (except for a walk on a leash), but somehow she
managed to push open the gate to get to a nearby road.
Witnesses reported that LuLu would wait until a car approached, then
calmly walk out into the road and lay down in front of the oncoming vehicle.
Drivers predictably honked and swerved, and one man later confessed to
stopping, but being unsure of what the creature was laying in the road he was
too afraid of getting out of his car to investigate. When a driver failed to
stop, LuLu would return to Jo Ann to check on her, and then leave again to try
and summon help. After about forty-five minutes the determined pig finally
managed to persuade a young motorist to stop and follow her to the Altsman's
mobile home. Entering, the young man called:
Lady,
your pig's in distress.
Jo Ann feebly replied:
I'm
in distress, too. Please call an ambulance.
The man, who remained anonymous, telephoned the emergency services and
paramedics quickly arrived. When LuLu attempted to ride along with Jo Ann to
hospital by climbing up into the back of the ambulance, the paramedics had to
gently let her know she had done enough for one day. In her rush to get out to
find help, LuLu had cut her pot-belly on a sharp edge of the too-small
doggy/piggy door. However, this was the only injury she sustained; remarkable
considering she lay on a busy highway for lengthy periods of time trying to
stop cars.
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