'She risked her life to help rescue dogs, cats and a rabbit': Heroic veterinarian runs straight into the LA fires to rescue as many animals as pawssible, so far saving 41 of them

Mariel Ruvinsky • Writer and Editor

Jan 17, 2025 9:00 AM EST

Disasters happen always. We hate them, and it's always difficult, but they happen. And although we know that people have been focusing on the bad endlessly with these latest LA fires, we have decided to focus on the good. In every disaster, there are heroes - people who go out of their way to save not only themselves and their families but their pets as well, like the handsome Turkish man who saved a cat from the rubble after a house collapsed, or the man who lost everything in a fire but saved his cat, and we could never forget all the stories of the people who have found and rescued freezing cats and kittens during this difficult winter.

And this year, a new hero emerges from the fires in LA. Literally. This vet has been running into burning buildings and saving cats, dogs and even a bunny, non-stop for days, opening her house as a makeshift shelter and doing her very best to save as many animals as pawssible. She is a real hero, and we could not be more thankful.

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via @OliLondonTV
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via @OliLondonTV
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via Animal Wellness Centers / NY Post
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via ZUMAPRESS.com / NY Post
As she told the NY Post, Annie simply could not stand the thought of so many animals getting hurt, and she knew that not all people had the resources to take care of them, so she opened her own house as a sanctuary. "I had a family bring in 10 dogs, and they had to leave behind their horses,” she told the Post. “To me, this is a no-brainer. I looked around and said, ‘I have a lot of space here. I can help.’”
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via @VasBroughtTox
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via @OliLondonTV
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via @RenattaOxendine
She is a hero. “I haven’t slept at all and my eyes are hurting from the smoke. I do it because I love animals and want to take care of them," she said. And despite all the work that she has done, she continues to worry. “The real animal tragedy is the large animals,” she added, speaking about how they were more difficult to rescue. “One woman asked me to help with her nine donkeys and the problem was she didn’t have trailers. They had to release them and they most likely didn’t make it.”
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via @OliLondonTV
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via @BonniedaWestie
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via @BestDogContent
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via @Judgement63
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via @WaalkesR105
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via @ShakesandBerry
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via @GigiLevangie
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via @OliLondonTV
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via @eljean
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via @TheRealStockMom
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via @wixelain