Dog's River Rescue Saves Holiday Weekend

By Amber Lester Saturday, July 10, 2010

Only a few weeks ago, Louis Buttner watched in shock when his one-year-old chocolate Labrador, Ruth, managed to squeeze her body through his truck window to chase a squirrel that caught her eye. In a moment, he imagined he would hit the mischievous dog. Luckily, he slammed the breaks and tragedy was avoided.

But Ruth was just warming up for her next adventure.

On July 3, Louis and his wife, Roma, were enjoying a day on the James River. The couple lives in Waverly, but keeps their boat at the Jamestown Marina and relishes any opportunity to take it out. That Saturday, the waters were crowded with people celebrating the Fourth of July weekend. Roma decided to go below the deck and rest in the cabin, and Louis decided to steer toward the island. He checked on Ruth – she was standing on the deck, as she often does when the family hits the water.

“I made a long, slow left turn to go back,” Louis says. “My wife got up from the cabin and we were riding along and she said, ‘Where’s Ruth?’”
He turned and saw Ruth had vanished. “I got panicky. I was really in shock,” he says.

The Buttners started searching the water, their eyes scanning the waves for a hint of their beloved pup. They decided she might have paddled toward the island, so Louis steered the boat up and down around the island, searching with no luck.

“My wife was thinking the worst,” he says. They searched for more than an hour and a half, to no avail. “We got more and more depressed. We ended up going in, reluctantly.”

Just before 6 p.m., James City County residents Richard Ording and Marcelo Palmaz were fishing near Jamestown Island when Palmaz spotted a dog bobbing in the water, her head barely visible above the small waves. The dog was about “four or five boat lengths” away, Palmaz says, and nearly a quarter-mile from the shore. He told Ording to turn toward her, and as soon as Ruth spotted the boat, she swam in its direction.

When they saw her, Ruth was heading straight for the Jamestown-Scotland Ferry channel. Ording says she might have been in peril within 20 to 30 minutes. “She was headed towards the ferry,” he says. “Had the dog gone another quarter-mile, she could have ended up in the shipping run and gotten munched.”

Palmaz pulled her into the boat and she immediately collapsed, exhausted from her fight against the current. She was wearing a tag that listed Roma’s cell phone number; Palmaz dialed the number, but Roma had left her phone at home.

Ording and Palmaz spotted two other boats nearby, one traveling back and forth, up and down the river. Unbeknownst to them, Louis was piloting that boat, pacing the river and searching for Ruth. They pulled up alongside the other boat, whose owner was not missing a dog, but by that time, Louis had left. The only thing left to do was wait for the owners to call back.

Neither Ording nor Palmaz was quite sure where to take the pup, but both had fallen for the happy lab. “She was a beautiful animal,” Ording says. He and his wife, Diann, had just gotten a new puppy, so they weren’t ready to take on another. Palmaz has a “particular” cat, but says he would have kept the dog if she wasn’t wearing a tag. He took her home to wait.

Exhausted and depressed, the Buttners pulled into their driveway in Waverly and entered their empty home. Louis was walking into the house when Roma shouted, “I have 11 missed calls!”

Relieved and excited, Louis called Palmaz and arranged to pick up Ruth the next morning. “Goodness gracious, he was such a great guy,” he says.

Louis and Roma had prayed that Ruth had somehow survived her fall into the water. Louis is a truck driver and often has to leave Roma home alone. Roma has been badly afflicted with arthritis, and Ruth had become a needed companion in the past year. “The dog brings her a tremendous amount of peace,” Louis says. “Ruth is a totally loyal dog and she’s just a blessing to us.”

On the morning of the Fourth of July, Louis pulled into Palmaz’s driveway to retrieve Ruth. Her ears perked up when she heard his car door open, and she bounded for her owner. It was a wonderful thing to see, Palmaz says.

Despite his objections, Palmaz was forced to accept $100 from Louis, who said if he didn’t take the money, Roma would come down there and insist.

“They saved Ruth’s life,” Louis says.

Ruth spent the rest of the weekend sleeping off her adventure, but Louis expects she’ll be back on the water sooner rather than later. “My wife wants to take her everywhere we go,” he says. “I’ll be much more careful to watch her.”