Scary incident with wire crate!! Beware leg caught/injured.

[Pilar, Sophie & Rico]

What a crazy morning. It started off with my sweet pups running and playing. While chasing each other they ran inside the wire crate and Sophie who has long skinny legs started to scream. We ran over and noticed that her leg had gone through one of the crate slot and she was stuck! We could not get her leg out and it was a scary panicking experience. Eventually we were able to release her leg and thankfully she was fine and Im so glad that she didn't break it. She sustained two little cuts.

My husband on the other hand sustained several bites on his arms, hands and bad bites to his bottom lip. I've never experienced anything like this. Will not let them play in the crates anymore and if you do have an emergency grab a towel and cover their face because they will bite when they are injured/ panicked. She was stuck- yelping very loud and biting us making it difficult to help her until we grabbed a towel wrapped her head to prevent the biting.

[Linda And Loo]

Glad everyone is ok! Grabbing a towel is a good idea. Would not have thought of it! Thanks for sharing!

[Bonnie and Kona]

How terrifying! I think we will all benefit from your advice given an emergency situation. Thank you for sharing your experience. I hope Sophie and your DH heal quickly.

[Nicky, Riley & Boris]

How scary and lucky that Sophie had no major injuries. I too am suffering from some scratches and bruises sustained in a panicky rescue situation yesterday so I know how you feel. This is a good reminder that the wire crates should come with a health warning.

[Ann Kendig]

This happened when Sheba and Duke were pups. Sheba's foot/ankle got stuck in the area under the door to the crate. She was screaming and drug the crate across the kitchen floor. I was by myself and was able to get her foot out but she did bite at me and her bladder let loose. Poor little Sheba. I no longer crate my dogs but after that incident I always made sure the crate door was shut. When I have a foster dog and use a crate I always make sure the crate door is closed when they aren't in it. Very dangerous when you have rambunctious dogs and want to include running in/out of the crate during play or zoomies. I also have to be very careful removing my fearful fosters from their crate as sometimes they don't want to come out on their own and it is very easy to get their foot caught when trying to get them out. Thankfully I've only had 2 fosters that didn't want to exit the crate. I'm sorry you all had to experience this. I hope your husband and Sophie are feeling better!

[Debb, Lucy & Oscar]

I'm sorry this happened! How scary for everybody.. Something similar happened to Oscar when he was very small. We'd put him in Lucy's older crate to give him easy access to the back patio door and put Lucy in a the new crate (the doors opened differently on the crates, thus the reason for not putting the new crate close to the back door). We were unable to find the divider for the old crate so used the new one. It left too much clearance under the divider (the crates were both supposedly the same size from the same maker but the new one was about 1" higher). Oscar got his leg caught under the divider and screamed/panicked when it happened. Luckily I was right there and got to him fast to release him. He didn't bite at all (he's the mellowest/sweetest pup you can imagine) and seemed very relieved to have me rescue him. We've never had another incident with the crate. We did find the old crate divider after that and it did fit properly.

[Lucy & AnnaBelle's Mom]

Happened here as well.  Sophie was maybe 6-8 months old.  She was trying to pull the bed out of the crate and was bracing her self on the outside of the crate to pull it.  Fortunately DH was home and was able to get her foot unstuck.  She was yelping but didn't try and bite us.  AnnaBelle is always sticking one of her paws out so I have been watching very closely to make sure her feet are small enough not to get stuck.  That was when I put the crate away and stopped using it for Lucy and Sophie.  Glad everyone is ok and this is a great heads up for everyone!

[Pilar, Sophie & Rico]

Thank you all, Here's an update. Sophie seems to be fine. We went out and I didn't crate her. I'm thininking that its going to be awhile before I do. She seems to avoid the crate area too. Poor baby! Hubby's lip is swollen And I can't imagine what it's going to look like in the morning. It also seems that she bite him through his thumb nail. Ouch! Might lose it. I wanted you all to be aware and learn from this incident.

[KLN]

How scary, so glad everything is ok (well except for your husbands lip). Thx for posting...I have a larger wire/metal crate for Finn but haven't used it yet for similar reasons...he tries to stuck his limbs through it every time I put him in there for brief time periods. Until he gets bigger I'm going to continue using his plastic crate...it's smaller (less room for him) but I think a lot safer. This post helped seal the deal (and my thinking on this) so thx!