Delayed Miracle From Fire Badly Burned Dog Limps Home After 15-Day Ordeal

A daring dash from a burning barn earned a badly burned pup named Carra a new lease on life and a new name: Miracle.

Her owners, Dale and Jody Walls and their children, thought the 10-month-old French mastiff had died from injuries she had suffered in a Jan. 19 fire that killed 33 other dogs.

Then, the badly burned survivor came limping home this week.

“It’s just amazing,” Jody Walls said. “She had to go past a stove and the burning part of the barn to get out.”

The fire killed several prize-winning French mastiffs and virtually wiped out the Wallses’ Riverbend Farms breeding kennel.

One dog - Beefy T. Bad Boy - sired the American Rare Breed Association’s current top-rated dog. Another, Gretchen, was the top American female.

Dale Walls estimated the lost dogs, eight of which belonged to friends, might have fetched $150,000 to $200,000. But Jody Walls considered them priceless.

“I think of them as children,” she said.

Anyway, she said, raising and showing rare purebred dogs “is more like a big hobby. It’s not anything you can get rich on. You definitely have to love the animals.”

Walls said the family will rebuild the kennel it started nine years ago in Bellingham. Friends have offered breeding stock from as far as Europe, but the process will be slow.

Besides Miracle, only an arthritic 6-year-old named Tubby and eight puppies survived the fire. Tubby and the pups were in the house.

The other dogs were in an old wooden barn that apparently was ignited by a wood stove used to keep the dogs warm.

The Wallses saw Carra escape through the fire but figured she had died of burns or smoke inhalation or was killed by coyotes when she failed to come back for more than two weeks.

“She just came running out of the barn, just screaming and running so fast,” Walls said. “We didn’t even know which one got out.”

She jumped a fence and ran off while the Walls’ tried unsuccessfully to save the other dogs. Dale Walls’ right arm is still bandaged from the burns he suffered.

“We could hear them, but we couldn’t get to them,” Jody Walls said. “That’s what was so hard.”

What’s worse, she said, their sons - Jared, 13, and Clint, 9 - were home for Martin Luther King Day when the fire broke out about 11 a.m. Since then, they’ve had a lot of nightmares, she said.

“I cried and cried,” Walls said. “It’s hard to wake up and not have them here. These were family dogs.”

She said Tubby also appeared to be suffering emotionally after the fire, crying and whining when she went outside. Afraid of losing Tubby, too, Walls wouldn’t let her go out alone or run free.

Now she’s convinced that, if she had let Tubby go, the dog would have found her granddaughter, Carra. She said Tubby was particularly upset Monday night and convinced them someone or something was outside the house.

What they found was a miracle, Walls said. A very hungry one.

She said Tubby is now back to her old “sweet” disposition, but Miracle has a lot of healing to do. The dog’s face and ears are badly burned, and it is painful for her to stand on her scorched paws. Her flanks also are burned and scabbed, and most of her fur is singed off.

“I think her show days are over,” Walls said. “But I know she’ll be with us for life.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo