Feline survives daring leap from apartment in video captured by Chicago Fire Department. A Chicago cat has survived after jumping out of a fifth-floor window to escape an apartment fire.
Chicago Fire Department personnel were taking a video of the exterior of the building as firefighters were extinguishing the blaze when a black cat appeared through billowing smoke at a broken window. The feline briefly tested the side of the building with its front paws, and then jumped.
Onlookers gasped as the cat fell. But it missed a wall and instead landed on all four paws on a patch of grass, bounced once and ran away.
“It went under my car and hid until she felt better after a couple of minutes and came out and tried to scale the wall to get back in,” said fire department spokesman Larry Langford.
The cat was not injured, Langford said, adding he was trying to track down its owner.
No injuries were reported after the fire, which was confined to one apartment. The cause of the fire hasn’t been reported by officials, nor how much damage resulted.
Fun Fact: Cats have a lower terminal velocity than their average threshold for death. This means that they can jump from literally any height with a 90% survival rate.
Specifically, according to a study done by the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, 132 cats falling from an average of 5.5 stories and as high as 32 stories, the latter of which is more than enough for them to reach their terminal velocity, have a survival rate of about 90%, assuming they are brought in to treat their various injuries that may occur because of the impact with the ground.
Source
VIDEO
Chicago Fire Department personnel were taking a video of the exterior of the building as firefighters were extinguishing the blaze when a black cat appeared through billowing smoke at a broken window. The feline briefly tested the side of the building with its front paws, and then jumped.
Onlookers gasped as the cat fell. But it missed a wall and instead landed on all four paws on a patch of grass, bounced once and ran away.
“It went under my car and hid until she felt better after a couple of minutes and came out and tried to scale the wall to get back in,” said fire department spokesman Larry Langford.
The cat was not injured, Langford said, adding he was trying to track down its owner.
No injuries were reported after the fire, which was confined to one apartment. The cause of the fire hasn’t been reported by officials, nor how much damage resulted.
Specifically, according to a study done by the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, 132 cats falling from an average of 5.5 stories and as high as 32 stories, the latter of which is more than enough for them to reach their terminal velocity, have a survival rate of about 90%, assuming they are brought in to treat their various injuries that may occur because of the impact with the ground.
Source
VIDEO
OMG! Did the cat have an owner?