Three fuzzy ducklings saved by group of strangers in Vancouver

Yesterday in Vancouver, a group of strangers came to the rescue when three little ducklings fell through a grate into the sewer.

"At several points throughout the journey, we weren’t sure if it would be possible to save these little guys, and with the concerted and good-hearted efforts of a group of cyclists, they made it," cyclist Christina Niven told the Province.

Niven was cycling along the Georgia Street viaduct when she spotted a duck with eight ducklings waddling along her bike lane.

"They all continued along, crossing one grate successfully and then onto another, at which point three of the little, tiny ducklings fell through into the sewer," Niven told the Province. "I stopped, along with a few other people to see if we could fish them out."

Niven called the city to report the incident, then focused on trying to free the trapped ducklings.

Up to 10 other cyclists stopped to help Niven.

[ Related: Ducklings stuck in a storm drain? There’s an app for that ]

The commotion scared off the mother duck. The group of strangers corralled the five ducklings still on the street into a box so they could safety transport them off the highway. They then reached through the grate and managed to grab one of the trapped ducklings.

A city crew arrived to free the other two.

The group of duckling rescuers reunited the rescued ducklings with their siblings, then brought the young birds to a nearby pond where their mother had been spotted.

Upon seeing her ducklings, the mother duck “stood up on the water and opened her wings in jubilation," Niven told the Province.

"It was a storybook, Walt Disney ending," Niven said, adding it "was a pretty awesome thing to see 10 to 12 grown adults all coming together to save the little baby ducklings."

Ducklings are lucky they're cute. People keep going out of their way to save the fuzzy birds' lives.

A few weeks ago, IndyCar practice in Detroit was stopped to save ducklings waddling across the track.

Last fall, a video of a mother duck and her flock of ducklings successfully crossing four lanes of traffic on a Toronto-area highway went viral.

And in 2011, a news anchor helped save 11 ducklings trapped in an Indianapolis parking lot storm drain.