This is the moment a sorry-looking husky is rescued from the frozen Baltic Sea adrift far from land on an ice floe.
Witnesses could barely believe their eyes when they saw the pooch drifting out into the Gulf of Finland from Russia’s western coast on Friday, 24th March.
But they alerted the Search and Rescue Service in Saint Petersburg, who launched a lifeboat to save the terrified pup.
A video of the rescue shows the crew pulling alongside the ice floe with the husky hunched over and clearly frightened and freezing.
As crew members reach down to reassure it, they lift up the dog and haul it aboard their rescue launch.
When they checked the husky’s collar they discovered her name is Bonita and quickly phoned her owner from the name on her ID tag.
Russian Emergency Situations Ministry officials said later in a statement obtained by Newsflash: “There it turned out that the name of the victim was Bonita, and the owner’s phone number was also indicated on the collar.
“Fortunately, very soon they were together again: happy, but pretty scared!”
It was not established how the husky ended up on the ice flow, the ministry claimed.
They added: “One thing is clear: she is definitely lucky.
“And the Saint Petersburg rescuers once again urge all four-legged animals not to go out on the deadly ice reservoirs.”