A woman was left devastated after 'fireworks' caused her dog to die from a heart attack.
Debbie Lucas let her 12-year-old cairn terrier Chica out into the garden of her home in Knowsley Village at around 7.30pm on Friday (January 27) night. However, after she became startled by "very loud" bangs, Chica suffered a heart attack and died.
Debbie believes the bangs were caused by fireworks. Posting on Twitter on Friday night, one woman wrote: "Some fools have let off industrial fireworks near my brother’s place and his neighbour's dog has had a heart attack and died. Why aren’t they banned yet?"
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Debbie told the ECHO: "We had just made our evening meal and we were just clearing up in the kitchen. Chica scratched on the door, she wanted to go out.
"There were no sounds at this point, it was just a normal evening. I let her out, it was dark and she was reluctant to go out, but she did. I carried on cleaning and then I heard her barking, quite distressed. So I opened the door and we could hear banging that sounded like fireworks.
"She’s a very anxious dog, she was always very scared of fireworks. She got spooked one bonfire night when she was a puppy and from there, she has been really scared. It’s got incredibly bad as she has got older.
"She’s petrified of any bangs now. We’ve always been very cautious of it and we’ve never been able to stay around here on Bonfire Night - it’s too bad.
"My husband got her in. As soon as she got into the kitchen, she just collapsed. Her back legs went. He picked her up and she looked like she was having a seizure. Next thing, we just knew. It was like a heart attack, her head was back.
"We took her into the lounge. I tried to perform CPR on her, but by that point I think she had already died."
"We are devastated about it - it was absolutely horrendous. There was no chance we could have taken her to a vet, it was too late and she was already having a heart attack."
Debbie does not know why fireworks were set off in the vicinity on Friday, but said uncertainty around when fireworks will be set off makes life hard for dog owners.
She added: "It’s the end of January. Why are people setting fireworks off? It cannot go on like this.
"We can’t prepare for fireworks like this. It’s so unpredictable, it’s out of the blue.
"We could get fireworks at any time - you can prepare for Bonfire Night and New Year’s Eve, but like this it’s so random, it could be any time?
"I always feared that this could happen - and it has. We had no idea that fireworks or anything would be going on last night."
According to the RSPCA, dozens of cases of cats and dogs being frightened by fireworks are reported each year, resulting in several deaths. A statement from the charity said: "We're piling pressure on the Government to bring in tighter controls around fireworks after a number of shocking incidents in which animals were attacked with fireworks or died having been spooked."
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