Firefighters are occasionally called to rescue a feline that has become trapped in a tree.
Saving the person who scales the tree to save the cat is something they are less used to doing.
But that’s exactly what happened on Tuesday night.
Syracuse resident Erin Quinn, 40, is a self-taught tree climber who spends her free time rescuing cats. She chose to assist after seeing a screenshot of a Nextdoor post about a cat that was stranded in a tree behind a house on Geddes’ Stinson Street.
Quinn picked up her climbing equipment the following morning and made her way to the tree. Quinn mentioned a black cat perched on a bough that was obviously upset. She tried to calm it down for two hours in the 80 degree heat. The cat refused to move, even though it was panting from the heat.
“I felt so terrible for the cat,” Quinn said. “I just love animals so much and I could feel how stressed it was.”
She took a rest, exhausted, and decided to come back later. However, she realized that time was running out when she noticed a storm coming that night. More than 19,000 customers in Central New York lost power as a result of the storm’s powerful winds and toppled trees.
After the storm had subsided, Quinn came back at 8:30 p.m. to try again. She then claimed to have made a “big mistake.”
By mistake, she slung her rope across a branch that was too far from the middle of the tree. As she ascended, she was trapped, hung in the damp, slick branches and unable to reach the trunk. Her legs started to lose circulation.
She advised the homeowner to contact the fire department after realizing she couldn’t descend on her own.
“Finally, I was able to get myself switched around to the other side of the tree and calmed down,” Quinn said.
Quinn claimed that in her nine years of climbing, she had only ever required assistance from firefighters once. She claimed not to have the right gear at the time, which was early in her climbing career.
Onondaga County 911 dispatchers were notified that Lakeside firemen arrived shortly after 8:45 p.m. to assist with her descent.
According to Capt. Phillip Vogt, a department spokesperson, they called in the Rescue Company of the Syracuse Fire Department since they had the specific equipment required to get Quinn down.
Firefighters dragged a ladder into the backyard to assist Quinn in getting down after the fire departments were unable to send a fire truck to the tree due to its location, she said.
After climbing a ladder to get to Quinn, a firefighter fastened her to a lowering system. She was returned to the ground safely.
But the feline remained in the tree.
In the hopes that the cat would climb inside, Quinn constructed a makeshift basket out of rope and threw it into the branches. The cat was gone by the time she got back the following day. There was nothing in the basket.
“I hope it jumped down from the tree and didn’t fall, Quinn said. I want to go out and try to find the cat again.”
According to Quinn, she often assists stray cats in her area and saves one or two cats from trees every year. She also organizes fundraisers for anyone in need of assistance paying for their pets’ medical bills.
