By Owen Boss
Staff Writer
NORTHAMPTON - Two animals thought to have perished in a fire at Meadowbrook Apartments Monday were miraculously found inside the building more than 24 hours after the blaze was extinguished.
Angelika Kochapski, her husband, Dave, and their 15-year-old daughter, Amanda, were just a few of the 22 tenants who stood helplessly outside Building 21 Monday, watching everything they owned, including many of their pets, burn to ashes.
The next day, Kochapski said she waited eagerly outside the burned out building while workers went into her apartment in search of anything salvageable - and if possible, to see if they could locate the bodies of her 5-year-old miniature pinscher, Zeus, and her cat, Wendy.
What happened next was little short of a miracle. A maintenance worker told Kochapski he had found her dog, soaking wet and covered in soot, cowering behind a toilet in a third-floor apartment across the hall from her own.
"When they came out of the building they said they saw him in a different apartment and he was snapping at them," Kochapski said. "They thought that maybe if I went up there he would come out from behind the toilet, and as soon as he saw me he jumped 4 feet into the air, ran over to me and jumped right around my neck."
After finding Zeus alive, Kochapski said, she rushed out of the building and drove him to the North King Animal Clinic for a check up after his daylong ordeal inside the building.
Then, when she arrived at the vet's office with Zeus, Kochapski received even more good news when workers clearing the building called to say they had miraculously found Wendy inside the building and were delivering her to the North King Street clinic.
"They found her right near where they found Zeus," Kochapski said. "I like to think that they were helping each other out through the fire, sticking together and telling each other which way to go."
Kochapski said she had almost lost all hope of finding any of her pets alive because at the time of the fire, the family's front door was locked.
"It really is a miracle they got out because when I went inside there was at least 3 or 4 feet of debris scattered on the floor in our apartment," Kochapski said. "They must have found some other way out when the ceiling collapsed."
Although both pets escaped the fire without serious injuries, Kochapski said Zeus' paws were singed and veterinarians kept Wendy at the clinic overnight Tuesday because soot from the fire caused her to develop a minor bacterial infection and she had to be treated for smoke inhalation.
Since the fire, Kochapski said Zeus has been scared to be by himself and family members have begun looking after him in shifts, and Wendy has been spending a lot of time under a hotel room bed.
"Zeus is a still a little traumatized. We got back from buying some clothes today and he was acting very worried when we got back to our hotel room," Kochapski said. "When we went to leave a second time, I heard him crying through the door, and it seems like he doesn't want to be away from us for a second. So, he's been in the car with me all day and we have been running errands together."
Although the family lost three gerbils and their pet frogs in the fire, recovering Zeus and Wendy, Kochapski said, has helped her family cope with losing the majority of their material possessions.
"I don't care about my things, you cannot replace pets," Kochapski said. "Especially a little dog like Zeus, he is just so special to us."
Owen Boss can be reached at oboss@gazettenet.com.
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