Heart-breaking footage shows the moment an injured puppy lets out terrified howls as its rescuer tries to save it from an ice-cold lane.
The dog was found covered in bruises and cuts as it shivering next to a pole in snowy St Louis, Missouri.
But Donna Lochmann, from Stray Rescue of St Louis, planned to save the poorly pooch.
‘This poor soul completely broke our hearts in two, she wrote on Facebook. ‘He was shivering and screaming in fear.’
She approaches him from her truck on the snow-covered road, offering comforting words with each step.
The puppy begins to whimper as she walks towards it and lets out screeching, terrified howls as it looks away.
Donna repeatedly says ‘it’s okay’ to try to reassure the dog but stops walking to stop it barking.
The footage cuts to Donna creeping up to the animal from behind as it continues its husky yelps.
Despite facing the wrong direction, it tilts its head to keep its eyes on her.
At this point, the dog’s shrieks reach a deafening pitch as it struggles to decide whether to flee or submit to Donna.
But it allows her to slip a pink lead over its head and stands up to face her.
Still unsure, the dog continues to whimper but in its mixture of fear and relief its bark dies down.
A later part of video shows Donna seemingly back by her car with the pup.
She strokes its chin and the mutt whimpers – yet in an affectionate way for the first time.
It looks up at her face as she says ‘it’s okay, we’re going to get you nice and warm okay. Don’t be scared, come with me’.
Surprisingly, as soon as Donna and the dog get in her Jeep, the pup relinquishes all fears – wagging its tail and licking its rescuer.
Unfortunately, however, once they got the sickly dog examined it was found he was suffering from a potentially serious medical condition.
‘He smells of infection from a wound on his side, and appears to have paraphimosis,’ Donna told dogheirs.com.
The urologic condition is where the retracted foreskin of an uncircumcised dog cannot returned to the normal position.
It appears the dog’s problems were caused by an embedded harness, which Stray Rescue said were rare.
The injuries had become badly infected.
But the puppy – now called Weezer – was given a medical back at the team’s trauma center and it was found that the paraphimosis was not serious.
A spokesman for Stray Rescue said: ‘Thankfully, his paraphimosis is a minor case.’
‘He looks to be about 7 months old and is as sweet as can be.’
Weezer was sent to a medical foster home following his rescue where he is expected to heal before being adopted.
‘He’s so happy he wouldn’t stop kissing his new foster mama Syl!’
St Louis, Stray Rescue is raising funds for a new trauma center.
