Good News: Dog barks and rescues Alabama family from fire, hailed as 'hero'

A Great Dane family dog is being hailed a hero after he saved an Alabama family’s lives awakening them with his bark as fire broke out at their rental home on September 8, early morning. The dog, Ralph, “doesn’t usually make a sound at night” but the 4-year-old Great Dane woke up to investigate the fire outside the family’s kitchen window and started to bark loudly to alert the inmates, AP reported, citing the Alabama local report. Derek Walker, his wife Maria Gilbert, and their two children, aged 12 and 9, were sound asleep the incident occurred at 2:30 am at their north Shelby County home in Birmingham. 

"He was in his kennel inside the house and we heard him barking,'' Walker was quoted saying in an AP report. “He usually doesn’t make a sound at night. And it was a different kind of bark,” he added.

Walker said that he woke up to the sounds of Ralph to inspect what was wrong and reheard a strange noise at the Caldwell Mill Lane home. As he proceeded to further look into the cause of the disturbance, Walker happened to notice the large flames at the kitchen window. AP reported Walker as saying, that he started “screaming fire”. That got the entire family woken up.

“My wife got up and she got our daughter and got her out,” Walker said. Ralph’s “different kind of bark” saved the family from the mishap. 

A battalion chief with the North Shelby Fire Department, Robert Lawson, reportedly said that the fire had started from the grill and spread across in no time. The fire had almost engulfed his home and had made it to the bedroom’s wall outside his son’s bedroom—Walker said in an AP report. 

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Ralph's 'vigilance' saved lives

As the family managed to pull their daughter out of the home to a safe area, Walker’s wife rushed to the son’s room and saw his bedroom full of smoke, as per the reports. Stating that his son was oblivious about the incident, Walker said, “He wasn’t awake because he sleeps covered with his blanket.” The family lost on elf their two miniature pig pets. While Ralph managed to make it out alive, the pig Pearl dies in the tragedy, Walker informed the local news sources. The couple’s house incurred massive damage from the fire and their furnishing has been scarred into ruins, however, the family was thankful for Ralph’s vigilance that saved their lives. “Without Ralph, I don’t think we would have made it,″ Walker said in an AP report. 

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