Missing dog rescued from Donegal island cliff after two weeks

A tourist whose dog was rescued from a cliff off the County Donegal coast more than two weeks ago has praised the “amazing” support of locals who helped to find her family pet.

Sarah Recinos Ralda was walking her Bernese mountain dog, Mali, on Arranmore Island on 16 August when she ran off in high winds.

Searches on land and sea failed to find her, but on Saturday the crew of a passing fishing boat heard barking and spotted Mali clinging to a cliff edge, 61m above sea level.

A member of the public then climbed down the cliff to free the dog, who had become trapped on a ledge after her leash got caught.

“We are really happy to have her back,” Ms Recinos Ralda told BBC News NI.

“She is completely fine, just a bit skinnier.”

She added: “I just want a big shout out to Arranmore people and everybody involved. They are just amazing; they are heroes.”

Ms Recinos Ralda, who is originally from Germany, is spending the summer in Ireland with her husband and four young children.

She was on a day trip to Arranmore Island with her children and some friends when Mali picked up a scent and ran off.

“We think it was a rabbit,” the dog owner explained.

“She kind of full-force pulled the leash out of my hand, and she stormed inland on the island, and she was gone.”

After spending some time looking for Mali, the family returned to their accommodation and put out a public appeal to find her.

“We went home, and it felt very gloomy, very weird the first night without her. I felt like I left her behind,” Ms Recinos Ralda said.

“I felt pretty helpless and a bit hopeless.”

But she added that local residents made a huge effort to assist her young family.

“Arranmore community is just next level,” she said.

“They were just so generous with their time and their efforts. Everybody was like: ‘Oh, we’re going out! We’re going for hikes. We’re going to look for her’.”

Helpers scoured the island for days without success.

Attempts to use a drone to search for the dog were hampered by windy weather.

There were also searches of the mainland in case Mali had managed to swim across.

Then on Saturday a fishing boat was sailing around Arranmore when some of the crew thought they heard a dog barking.

“We were kind of looking at each other thinking ‘are we hearing things? what’s going on?’,” the boat John Paul Baska told BBC News NI.

“Then we started looking at the cliff face where we were and you could just see… the dog is a dark colour and the rocks are quite dark as well… but the white chest of the dog, we could see the movement and we could see a bit of a red lead coming from the dog”.

The fishing crew raised the alarm with Malin Head Coast Guard, but a member of the public was able to get to Mali on the cliff edge first.

The captain of the boat said everyone involved in the rescue was “just ecstatic”.

“After two weeks probably when everyone had given up hope, and there she is good and well.”

Despite her ordeal, the dog was in good health and was not dehydrated, although she was hungry.

Mali was later reunited with her family, and video footage shows the very excited Bernese enjoying lots of pets and cuddles.

“She’s in perfect condition,” Ms Recinos Ralda said.

“She had access to rainwater the whole time, and there was like a little cave there, so she actually had a bit of a shelter.”

The dog owner added that she is not sure if Mali spent the full fortnight on the cliff edge because she was so unscathed and so full of energy after her ordeal.

“We don’t know. We will never know, but it’s a miracle, and we are really happy to have her back.”