Female dog euthanised after getting tangled in illegal connections

Outcries around the dangers and recklessness of illegal connections grow with every life taken. Adults and children have fallen victim to the exposed wires but animals too are in the firing line.

Last Thursday, 5 November, a business owner near a field adjacent to the Princess informal settlement called the Roodepoort/ Krugersdorp SPCA after he heard desperate yelps coming from the field. Senior Inspector Eric Taljaard and Kennel Supervisor Watson Mupfufhi responded to the scene and found a tan female dog trapped in a ditch, struggling among a series of electrified wires.

“The ditch had been dug to hide illegal electrical wires and the poor animal had stumbled into the ditch on top of the live electrical wires. Every time the poor animal moved she was electrocuted,” stated Roodepoort / Krugersdorp SPCA Manager, Mandy Cattanach. She recalled how her staff had to heartbreakingly watch the confused animal jerk and contort throughout her ordeal.

Illegal connections have claimed the lives of several human beings recently as exposed wiring runs unmarked between poles, rooftops and the ground in a fatal high-voltage web. When the SPCA staff pulled the dog from the wires using a thick blanket it revealed the extent of the dogs injuries. Mandy recalled, “Inspector Taljaard said he could smell how the dog had been burnt by the electrical wires. She was in a lot of pain and very disorientated so, unfortunately, due to her severe burns and internal injuries we had no choice but to end her suffering.”