An ordinary day turned into a dramatic rescue mission for Mark Headon, a 27-year-old painter and decorator.
While driving to the city to pick up his daughter, he spotted something unusual in the canal by the road.
Driven by curiosity, he stopped the car and was shocked to see an animal in the water, fighting for its life. Thankfully, Mark, the hero of our story, wasted no time in reacting.
It all started when Mark noticed animal ears in the water. After stopping the car, he saw a baby deer in the cold water, struggling to keep its head above the surface. He recalled the heart-wrenching sight in an interview:
“I was driving to pick up my daughter when something caught mine and Jamie’s eye in the canal. I thought it was a fish as we do a lot of fishing, when we realized it was a deer.”
Mark assumed the baby deer had been in the water for hours and knew he had no time to waste.
He immediately jumped into the freezing water and managed to catch the baby deer. Then, he gently brought the deer to safety, while Jamie assisted from the land.
The poor baby deer was frightened and cold, so Mark and Jamie wrapped it in blankets to keep it warm and to help it calm down.
The heroes of our story knew that leaving the baby deer near the busy road was not an option. So, they took the poor animal to a friend’s home and instantly reached out to an animal rescue organization for additional help. Mark added:
“We took it to a friend’s nearby, where we fed and watered it, waiting for it to come round. We waited for the Wildlife Trust to come pick it up and take it to safety – which they did after an hour or so, and informed me that we had saved the baby’s life and thanked us for what we had done.”
The baby deer had probably been in the freezing water for hours and was seconds away from drowning. Thankfully, Mark happened to be in the right place at the right time, saving the baby deer’s life in the nick of time.
The whole rescue mission was captured on a video and quickly went viral, gaining more than 600,000 views in just a couple of hours.
The baby deer was surrendered to an animal organization where a brighter future awaits him, while Mark and Jamie will remember this day for the rest of their lives.