An early morning fire in Stockton damaged two buildings in a fourplex over the weekend, but one family was able to escape unharmed thanks to their 8-month-old pit bull Sasha.
As flames began to race through the residential structure on East Yorkshire Drive on Sunday, Sasha began to bang at the back door.
“I open it and she runs in and starts barking at me like crazy and I was like, ‘OK, this is weird. This is not like her,'” owner Nana Chaichanhda told KTLA sister station KTXL in Sacramento on Thursday.
Chaichanhda quickly ran into the bedroom to grab her 7-month-old daughter and saw Sasha beside her.
“She had already had my baby by the diaper and was dragging her off the bed,” she said. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, what are you doing?'”
Fire crews responded within minutes of the initial 911 call, and though the flames only reached her attic, Chaichanhda’s home is now uninhabitable.
Her cousin was not home at the time of the fire.
Chaichanhda and her cousin are now staying with their aunts that also live in the fourplex. As they try to start over after losing their homes, she is thankful for her dog’s heroics and hopes it changes people’s view of pit bulls as family pets.
“It meant a lot. I owe her everything. If it wasn’t for her, I would have still been in bed and things could have taken a worse turn,” Chaichanhda said.
She said it was one of the rare nights where she left Sasha outside, and it likely ended up being the reason everyone made it out alive.
The Stockton Fire Department says the cause is still under investigation. The family is still trying to get electricity on in the complex for the two buildings that weren’t affected.