A Merced County Girl Scout troop is doing its part to save pets’ lives. Here’s how
Local pets just got a much-needed hand to help them survive when a fire breaks out, thanks to a local Girl Scout troop.
Girl Scout troop 3003, which is based in Merced, on Wednesday donated six pet oxygen mask kits to the Merced County Fire Department/Cal Fire.
The masks were dropped off at the Merced County Emergency Operations Center in Atwater. The troop used money raised through their Girl Scout Cookie fundraiser to pay for the kits.
With the latest donation, the troop has donated a total of 10 kits to local firefighters. The kits cost about $100 each.
“Our troop is really full of a lot of go-getter girls, who love animals, who love doing activities and getting together,” said troop leader Lily Walker.
In a normal year, Walker says her troop of about 11 girls would normally sell 6,000 boxes of cookie. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, this year the troop sales were limited to just over 4,000 boxes.
“They wanted to make sure they made an impact with those cookies and they were able to do some community service projects,” Walker said.
The girl scouts have seen the pet masks they’ve donated in the past save the lives of animals. Firefighters used donated masks to save three dogs from an apartment fire in Merced in November.
The latest donation will allow the Merced County Fire Department to place pet masks on six different apparatuses throughout the county, according to Merced County Fire Department Assistant Chief Mark Pimentel
“In many incidents we’ve gone to before we’ve seen animals that have been pulled out that we’ve tried to resuscitate with a human-style mask,” Pimentel said. “This mask will give us the opportunity to help these animals in need and actually give them a greater deal of oxygen.”
Pimentel handed out certificates to four of the troop members who were present on Wednesday night: Raelynn Flores, Bree Sterkson, Violette Walker and Kate Nicholson.
“It makes me feel really good that we’ve can be part of helping save animals lives and that we can just help out in the community we live in,” Sterkson said.
