Christmas Day rescue for dog that fell down a cliff

The dog’s owners called the emergency services shortly before 1pm, reporting that their pet, a beagle/pug cross called Cook, was trapped on a ledge at Pinhay Bay. He was not injured but was unable to climb back to the top or make his way down to the beach below.

Beer and Lyme Regis coastguard teams were called out along with Lyme Regis lifeboat. The lifeboat crew spotted the dog on a ledge 20 metres up the cliff face and two of them swam ashore and tried to coax him to safety.

Volunteer crewman Andy Butterfield said: “The dog could see us and hear us, but he made it very clear he was not interested in leaving his ledge and making his way down to the beach. All he did was sit up there barking and howling at us.

“The base of the cliff was too unstable for us to climb up to him, so we quickly concluded that ‘Cook’ would have to be rescued from above.”

The coastguard teams then carried out a dramatic rope rescue. After carrying their equipment 600 metres from the place where their vehicle was parked, they lowered a rope technician over the cliff edge to reach Cook. The dog was safely brought back to the clifftop and reunited with his owners.

Meanwhile the RNLI crew made their way back along the shoreline and swam back to the lifeboat. They returned to Lyme Regis at 3:50pm where the boat was met by shore crew for a fresh water washdown, before all volunteers were able to re-join their families for a delayed Christmas lunch. It was the lifeboat's first ever service call-out on a Christmas Day.

The rescue drew praise from viewers of the Beer Coastguard Rescue team’s post about it on Facebook, with people expressing gratitude to all the coastguard and RNLI volunteers for giving up part of their Christmas celebrations to help the trapped dog.