DOGS Control Owner's Running CAR, Crashes into WAL-MART

Pictures and video of a dog on the steering wheel of a car can be either an endearing or hilarious image, but that’s usually when the pets have been posed on a car at rest, or less likely when a puppy is sitting on the driver’s lap. But what happens when the car is running and the dog on the wheel really is in control?

An employee of a West Virginia Wal-Mart on her break during a hot morning of Friday July 29 got to find out nearly up close and personal, according to a Fox News report. As she and other witnesses would later relate to local network WSAZ-TV, a car slowly drove out of its space in the Wal-Mart parking area towards where the employee was taking her time off. Initially thinking the action to be some joke, she quickly realized she was dealing with a runaway vehicle. The clincher was the dog she spotted manning the car’s steering wheel.

`While the vehicle was clearly out of control (doggie driver notwithstanding), it was also going at a comfortably slow pace, plenty of time for the staffer to get away as the car ran into a pillar fronting the Wal-Mart entrance with a slight jolt. Then another dog on the shotgun seat elicited a few laughs by rolling down the passenger side window to give the gathering crowd a once over. Other witnesses would describe the whole thing to be like an animated cartoon rerun, corroborated by security camera footage of the event. The two dogs of course could not give any meaningful comments on what they have done.

As 911 responders arrived on the scene, a quick page alert inside the store led to the car’s owner, a 70-something elderly lady, to come forward. She explained that she had left the car running while she went in for some grocery shopping, so that the air conditioner could keep her puppies comfortable inside the vehicle just in case the summer got hotter.

It was a sensible choice, especially in the light of a boy who died of a heat stroke in Dallas a few days earlier from that time, when he was left in his family’s SUV while they attended a Bible study. She just didn’t think her pets would take advantage of her car like they did.

With negligible damage done to both Wal-Mart wall and car, no charges were recommended against the old lady or her dogs, and no official report was filed by police. The guilty mutts got home as scot-free as possible, with their master driving.

Photo Credit to boingboing.net