Thursday, 4:30 PM
DOG SAVES OWNER
BY DAVID ABEL AND MICHAEL LEVENSON, GLOBE STAFF
A yipping dog saved a 91-year-old woman from dying in a cloud of lethal gas this week at her Braintree home, the survivor and authorities said.
Josie, a 4-year-old brown-and-white mix of shih tzu and rat terrier, began barking nonstop shortly before 9:30 a.m. Wednesday.
The racket eventually awoke Rose Cappola, who was asleep in bed when her oil burner malfunctioned and began spewing smoke, along with an odorless, colorless, and potentially lethal dose of carbon monoxide, firefighters said. Cappola lives alone with her pet, which normally sleeps next to her on her bed.
"Little Josie, God bless her, she saved me," Cappola said Thursday. "She’s a smart little thing, and she’s a very good dog, a lovely, lovable dog."
After she awoke, Cappola went to the basement to shut off the furnace, dialed 911, and waited outside. Firefighters found carbon monoxide levels were 28 to 30 parts per million, more than two-thirds higher than what would trigger an evacuation alert on home alarms, according to Larry Mawn, a Braintree firefighter.
Firefighters opened windows in the house and had Cappola taken to South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, where she was treated and released.
"That dog saved her life," Mawn said.
