StoryAn unwanted dog which was put down with drugs, put in a plastic bag and then through a rubbish compressor has been found alive moments before being buried in a landfill site.
The five-year-old shepherd-Labrador cross was found clawing through the plastic bag on the back of a rubbish truck at the Edgeboro Landfill in East Brunswick, New Jersey.
Officials say an animal control officer gave the dog two injections, one to sedate it, the other to stop its heart.
He listened with a stethoscope for a heartbeat, and on not hearing one, placed the body in a plastic bag.
The dog had been taken to animal control officers by a woman who said she could no longer care for it.
"Obviously, it's a miracle," a spokesman for the animal control department said. "It's just amazing it lived through that whole mess."
Fifty-seven people have contacted the East Brunswick dog pound, where the animal is being cared for, to offer it a home, reports the News Tribune.