MCADAM, N.B. – Troy Day was never the kind to believe in miracles, but a four-legged companion changed his mind on that five years ago.
On a stormy night in March, 2010, Troy left his family camp heading home on his snowmobile, near McAdam.
“As I was going around the point into Spednic it started to snow and I just got off course a little bit and instead of going around an island, I went through an island. I hit it,” he said.
The impact punctured his lung, broke his back, neck and every rib. Day broke 26 bones in total.
He managed to shuffle his way to shore and collapsed, unconscious in the cold for the rest of the night.
He woke up the next morning.
“My hands were frost bitten and black and I was holding my hands up to the sun for just a little bit of heat and out of the corner of my eye I could see figure coming and I looked and I thought it was a coyote,” he said.
“Then, as it gets closer, I am like nope that’s a dog in really bad shape, a big German shepherd.”
The dog, a stray, was haggard, timid and underweight.
“He walked, nose to tail underneath my hand and went up to my sled and licked around my sled and he laid down and looked at me,” Troy said.
As he struggled to stay alive, the stray dog never budged. He kept watch over Troy all day.
Troy’s family started to get worried back at the family camp.
“I laid my head on the pillow and my whole body shivered and a shiver went over me and I said, ‘Oh no I hope he’s alright,” said his brother, Larry Day.
Around four p.m. the next day, Larry set out to find his brother. He eventually found him, near death, laying on the ice.
“When I got to him he was taking his hands and he was shoveling snow into his mouth he was so thirsty,” he said.
“He was like, ‘Where did the dog come from? Whose dog?’ I said I don’t know he just showed up,” said Troy.
Troy spent the next 13 days in the intensive care unit. He often wondered about the dog.
Larry looked after the dog for awhile, but then, he gave him away.
Yet, not long after he was released from the hospital, Troy found the dog on his front steps.
“We’ve had him every since.”
He’s a faithful companion that Troy now calls “Bud.”
“He needed me as much as I needed him. We saved each other.”
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