In June 2018, Steven Kane and his family embarked on a relaxing summer road trip across England. About eighty miles into the trip, they decided to stop in a seafront area and relax a bit in the sun.
While they were stopped, Kane made a startling discovery: the family had picked up a little hitchhiking cat.
The cat was sitting behind the car’s grille, thankfully in an area that didn’t get hot. Kane described the moment he saw the cat to the RSPCA:
“We’d pulled up at the seafront near the green and I was playing on the green with my brother’s little girl when I looked up and spotted him,” Kane said. “He is lucky that I saw him. I have no idea where we picked up our little hitchhiker, it could have been anywhere.”
Kane tried to get the cat out, but he seemed to be stuck. And so, Kane called the Automobile Association (AA), and they came to dismantle the car.
The AA removed the car’s bumper and headlights, and then finally, they were able to reach the cat. He then called the RSPCA, and an inspector, Lucy Brennan, came to pick up the little hitchhiker. The RSPCA decided to name the cat Ford after Kane’s car.
“He was very smelly and very hungry,” Brennan said in a press release. “The AA explained that even if the cat had been trapped when the motorist was driving the car, luckily the area he was in has no moving parts and doesn’t get hot when the engine is on. Having said that, it must have been quite an ordeal for poor Ford.”
Brennan took Ford to the vet, where she learned he had a tail injury.
The vet wasn’t sure if the injury was from the car or if he had it already. Besides that, Ford was very healthy. The vet also checked to see if Ford had a microchip, but she couldn’t find one. Because of that, the RSPCA wasn’t sure if Ford was a stray or not.
Brennan took Ford to the RSPCA’s Danaher branch, and he quickly settled into the shelter. The tired cat gratefully ate all the food Brennan gave him, and then he settled in for a well-deserved nap.
Ford will now stay with the RSPCA for a few weeks, recovering from his ordeal. The RSPCA is trying to find his former owner, but if they can’t, they’ll put him up for adoption. And Ford already has one potential adopter: the family who found him.
“I think we were all relieved he was rescued and my brother really wants to adopt him now,” Kane said.
Ford probably used one of his nine lives on his car journey, but thankfully, the cat is doing okay now. We’re sure that Ford will be staying away from car grilles in the future!
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