WEST SAND LAKE, N.Y. (NEWS10) — A Good Samaritan watching a “swine cam” is being credited with saving two pregnant Gloustershire pigs from a New York barn fire.
Laura Palladino, who had visited the pigs at June Farms a couple of weeks earlier, logged on to a livestream over the weekend to check to see if the pigs had given birth. Instead, she saw smoke that quickly turned into a fire.
The swine cam livestream had been installed the day before to allow viewers to watch the pigs, Lucy and Ethel, give birth.
“I logged on and at first, I thought it was just, like, a wood-burning stove in the background,” Palladino said.
Apparently, Ethel, one of the pigs, had knocked over a heat lamp.
Palladino, who lives 60 miles away in Dutchess County, New York, recounted the minutes spent frantically calling the farm and the local fire department while watching the fire grow.
“I just called 911, but I’m in Dutchess County, so the 911 sent me to Dutchess County 911. And the operator, he was like, ‘What? You’re watching a YouTube video?'” she said.
Palladino was able to contact the farm, where owner Matt Baumgartner and farmhand Joshua Vics helped get the fire under control until fire crews arrived.
“My mind immediately went to the worst. My heart dropped into my stomach,” Vics said. “I don’t like to think about how bad it could have been if she didn’t say something.”
Vics said the newly installed web cam saved the pigs.
“I never thought that when we saw these pigs that I would technically end up saving their life,” Palladino said.