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Time and time again, dogs prove to us why they are called “Man’s Best Friend”.
And in another display of dogs’ unwavering loyalty, a Russian dog was recently found patiently sitting beside a frozen river where her owner tragically met his end, waiting for him to come back.
RT on X (previously Twitter) shared a video of the dog, named Belka, and how she refused to leave the site where her owner died.
Belka’s owner, a 59-year-old man, was reportedly riding his bicycle in Russia’s frozen Ufa River on November 24 when the tragic incident happened.
He fell into the freezing water when the brittle ice beneath him suddenly gave away.
The Sun reports that a Good Samaritan tried to save him, but the river’s strong currents were no match for him.
The Good Samaritan reportedly nearly lost his own life trying to save Belka’s owner, and was found suffering with severe frostbite.
A multi-day search was launched to find Belka’s owner, and rescue crew were able to locate the man’s bicycle, and later his body, in the Ufa River downstream.
Kirill Pervov, head of the rescue service in Bashkiria, told The Sun, “During the search, the rescue team used an air cushion boat with a hooking device to survey the river bottom.”
“Search work was complicated by difficult conditions – a strong current and unstable ice crust.”
Ever since the incident, Belka has been waiting for her owner to come home. The pooch can be found sitting on the ice, day and night, even while rescue operations were underway.
RT reveals that even though the man’s family took Belka to their home, the loyal pooch kept coming back to the same spot where she lost her owner.
The Russian dog’s loyalty has been compared to the legendary Japanese Akita dog, Hachiko, who famously waited at the Shibuya Station in Japan for his owner, Hidesaburō Ueno, to return for almost 10 years.