Just recently, Zabinskas went down into a mineshaft because a little face was peering up out of it. He managed to sedate and carry a kangaroo back onto solid ground.
And so when another call came in earlier this month about an animal stuck at the bottom of another mineshaft, Zabinskas expected he would have to go it alone.
Thankfully, this time was a bit different.
When Zabinskas arrived at the mineshaft in Invermay, Victoria, Australia, he had help. And the small wallaby stuck down at the bottom needed all the help he could get.
Six firemen and emergency services workers were there to help the little guy, who came to be named Louie.
“A host of personnel from Creswick and Ballarat took charge of the incident and conducted the rescue of the animal with military precision,” Zabinskas wrote on the FFAR Facebook page. “It was a relief to be able to leave my climbing equipment in the van and watch a very professional and efficient operation.”
Louie had a whole community of people determined to save his life. And when he finally surfaced, rescuers realized that they arrived not a moment too early.
“The rescue was a complete success,” Zabinskas wrote, as he and Helen Zabinskas attended to their new patient.
Louie was very weak and had probably been stuck down in the shaft for a while: He was totally covered in maggots.
The little wallaby received first aid care on the scene before being driven to Hepburn Vet Clinic for an examination and to get cleaned up.
“He initially received IV fluids and various treatments and he is now eating and drinking well,” Manfred Zabinskas told The Dodo.
It took hours to get the maggots off of Louie, but soon he was resting up at FFAR.
Helen Zabinskas held Louie in her arms while giving him a bottle, helping to build up Louie’s strength.
“Aside from the usual exhaustion and dehydration, the little boy appears OK,” Manfred Zabinskas wrote on Facebook.
But there’s no reason to rush Louie’s recovery. His rescuers want to make sure he’s as strong as possible before he’s out on his own again.