SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — This cat all cozied up in her San Diego home, just spent four months in the wild. Her name is Max. She ran away from her owners, Nori and Mike Johnson, while they were all camping at Crater Lake National Park in Oregon.
“She ran down into the caldera down into the trees which is super scary,” said Nori Johnson.
The Johnsons reported Max missing and posted to a Facebook group for help. Cat rescuer Shannon Jay called them almost immediately. Shannon is a retired police officer who has rescued hundreds of cats over the last five years.
"For the most part I’m free to do this work and travel where I’m needed,” Shannon said.
He spent more than 400 hours searching for Max. He put cat food and thermal cameras throughout the national park and occasionally caught glimpses of Max walking around.
“She was so adapted to surviving in the wilderness,” Shannon said.
Shannon says Max survived off rodents and mice.
“Not one single point in that four months did she eat a single bite of food I had left for her,” Shannon said.
As the winter approached, Shannon and the Johnson family started to lose hope.
“We even had a talk, we might just have to accept that she’s not going to come back to us,” Mike Johnson said.
But after 122 days, Shannon found max in the middle of a snow storm and reunited her with her family.
“He was saying she’s one in a million and I said no, you’re one in a billion," Nori Johnson said. "He never gave up. There’s no words for how grateful we are.”
