—A big shout out to Tiffany Valdez, Rico Gonzales, and the staff on Flight #1662 for making Mellow's trip home stress free—
We were recently on KPIX and KRON for finding a lost cat of six years and reuniting him with his military family.
Mellow the cat getting ready to fly across states to go home
On May 18, while picking up our mail, my wife and I encountered a friendly cat with no identification. He immediately went up to us and rubbed his body against my leg, which is not typical behavior for a feral cat. We picked him up and took him to a local vet to scan for a microchip. It turned out he was registered with HomeAgain, and we were able to notify the owners.
We found out the cat's name was Mellow. We were shocked to learn that he had been missing for six years and that the owners, a military family, had moved away from the Bay Area and were now living in Georgia. As an Air Force Veteran, I understood how difficult it was to be separated from family thousands of miles away on deployment or relocation, so we reached out to several news stations for assistance. The GoFundMe that was setup to help pay for the trip quickly reached its goal, and we were ready to bring Mellow home. After evaluating several airlines, the owners made travel arrangements with Southwest Airlines due to their excellent customer service. Southwest was able to waive the pet fee and even shipped out a carrier to make Mellow comfortable. Southwest Employee Rico was available to escort Mellow and my wife through the TSA screening process and get Mellow checked out in a separate room. The last thing we needed was a scared cat running loose in the airport. The journey back home was definitely long for Mellow. A six-hour flight in addition to a three-hour drive from the airport, but Mellow is finally glad to be home.
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