‘Miracle dog’ found weeks after apartment fire
After being left alone for 14 days in a frigid, burnedout apartment with no food, Marble didn’t seem the worse for wear.
Marble is a black-andwhite Chihuahua — not even a year old — who became mixed up during the commotion of an apartment fire in Mount Clemens that left 22 renters displaced and eight injured and was thought to be lost.
But after enduring two weeks on her own, someone spotted Marble peering out from a secondfloor unit at the apartment building and notified her owner.
“She’s a miracle dog,” said her owner Dino Rasera, who was overjoyed to have his little buddy back and safe.
Rasera was heartbroken over the past two weeks thinking of his dog being stranded without food or shelter.
Even though the fire left him and his father temporarily homeless, the matter was made worse by not knowing what happened to Marble.
Rasera, 35, who works at Powder Cote II in Mount Clemens, was asleep on the night of Feb. 13 when the fire broke out at River North Village Apartments. Mount Clemens firefighters pounded on his door and ordered the occupants to evacuate the burning structure.
“I was just trying to grab my clothes,” he said. “But the police and firefighters rushed us out, I couldn’t even grab my car keys. I could have sworn Marble got out but once we were out there, there was no sign of her.”
After the commotion died down and Rasera and his father were given temporary shelter at Fairfield Inn, he began looking for his four-legged friend. With a core group of supporters they established a GoFundMe page and sent out more than 400 fliers.
The days dragged on. But on Saturday, Rasera got a phone call and text messages with photos showing the dog was still in the remainder of the apartment building.
“She was there for 14 days in the cold, you know how Michigan is in the winter, plus the fire and the hose spraying the water, no food,” he said. “We came down here every single day calling her name, just doing what we could to find her.”
Mount Clemens Mayor Laura Kropp said the discovery of Marble was the latest in a series of good news following the fire. She noted the community had responded by donating almost $40,000 and $12,000 worth of gift cards to the victims.
“She is resilient, tough and determined...just like the residents of Mount Clemens,” Kropp said in a Facebook post about the dog.
Rasera, who drove down to Kentucky to pick up the dog when she was newly born last spring, said he was “blessed to have her back.” Marble was covered in soot from the fire that has been cleaned off her and she was back to her old self barking at other canines in the area.
“I have to thank my friends, I don’t even know their last names, but Donna, Debbie and Elizabeth for helping me,” Rasera said Sunday.
“Marble was Michigan’s most wanted Chihuahua. I really do love her.”