Air Canada flight diverted to save dog from freezing

An Air Canada pilot had to change the course of an international flight when it meant saving a dog’s life.

The Toronto-bound plane departed from Tel Aviv, Israel, on Sunday when the pilot noticed that there was a heating malfunction in the plane’s cargo, CityNews reports.

The seven-year-old French bulldog named Simba was traveling in a crate on the flight that was about to go over the Atlantic Ocean when the temperature in the cargo area started to fall. The dog might have not survived the flight.

So the pilot decided to divert the plane with 232 passengers on-board to Frankfurt, Germany, where Simba was placed on another flight and then the plane continued on its route to Toronto.

Despite the 75 minutes delay and about $10,000 in fuel costs, an aviation expert says the pilot did the right thing.

“The captain is responsible for all lives on board, whether it’s human or K-9,” Phyl Durby told CityNews. “If you look at the outside temperature, if it’s minus 50 or 60, there is some insulation but it will probably still get down to below freezing (in the cargo area).”

“The captain grew rightfully concerned for the dog’s comfort and well being,” Peter Fitzpatrick, a spokesman for Air Canada, told CBC News in an email. “With the altitude it can become very uncomfortable, and possibly the situation could have been life threatening if the flight had continued.”

The dog’s owner, German Kontorovich was grateful to be reunited with Simba at Toronto’s Pearson Airport: “It’s my dog, it’s like my child. It’s everything to me,” he told CityNews. It was also Simba’s first time on an airplane.

“Well we recognize this was an inconvenience for our customers, the overall reaction was positive, particularly once people understood the dog was in potential danger but safe as a result of the diversion,” Fitzpatrick told BuzzFeed.