QUEENS — A litter of tiny kittens and their mom are looking for a new home after police officers rescued them from a St. Albans storm drain Saturday morning, hours before heavy rain washed through the area.
Thanks PO.Paige for baby kittens you rescued. #Meow #Adorable & #ThisIsWhatWeDo pic.twitter.com/n0r87HpivX
— NYPD 113th Precinct (@NYPD113Pct) July 30, 2016
On Saturday around 10:30 a.m., police officers Joseph Paige and Elizabeth Leudesdorff as well as Sgt. Roxanne Ludemann of the 113th Precinct in South Jamaica, responded to a call of a dispute between a landlord and a tenant on 173rd Street, near 115th Avenue. The two were arguing because the tenant wanted to install cable, but the landlord would not allow a Verizon installer on scene to perform work, police said.
As the officers were trying to resolve the dispute, they spotted four kittens and their mom in a nearby storm drain.
Summer (Courtesy of the 113th Precinct)
The homeowner told the officers that the mother is a stray cat that lives in the area and that he occasionally feeds her.
Ludemann said she believes the feline must have given birth to the kittens in the storm drain, thinking that it was a safe place.
Knowing that the weather forecast called for storms, the officers borrowed a ladder from the Verizon truck operator, opened the drain and went down to pull the kittens to safety.
Oreo (Courtesy of the 113th Precinct)
“That was a good thing that we got them because that night it had rained really really heavy so who knows if they would have survived,” said Ludemann.
The officers took both the kittens and their mom to the 113th Precinct station house on Baisley Boulevard, where one of the baby cats already got adopted by nightshift Officer Sheryl Taylor, Ludemann said.
Winter (Courtesy of the 113th Precinct)
The officers, who named the remaining tree kittens Winter, Oreo and Summer, and nicknamed their mom Midnite, are hoping to find new homes for all of the cats soon.
“We are asking everyone around if they want the kittens," Ludemann said. "But we are also trying to get the mom adopted as well."
Midnite (Courtesy of the 113th Precinct)
