Galena, a 6-year-old shorthair cat, was found in an Amazon warehouse a week after sneaking into a 90 x 90 cm cardboard box.
When Carrie Clark received a phone call on April 17th from a vet in California, informing her that her missing cat from Lehi, Utah, had been found nearly 800 km away, her first reaction was disbelief.
“I couldn’t believe it was real,” Clark told The New York Times in an interview on the evening of April 28th. “I told the vet, ‘I think this is a joke.’”
But it wasn’t a joke! It turned out that Galena, Clark’s 6-year-old shorthair cat, had slipped into a returned Amazon package inside a 90 x 90 cm cardboard box along with five pairs of steel-toe boots. The cat was then shipped across two states to one of Amazon’s warehouses, where the staff discovered her.
Clark explained that Galena survived the unbelievable journey without any food or water. She added that, despite the ordeal, Galena was relatively healthy, only suffering from mild dehydration.
Two factors likely helped Galena: an unsealed seam on the box allowed for air circulation, and the moderate weather kept her from overheating or getting too cold.
“The fact that the cat survived is truly a miracle,” Clark shared.
She speculated that Galena must have jumped into the box while her husband was packing it. The cat snuck inside while he stepped away to get some tape to seal the box. “Galena rarely meows, and she loves boxes, so she was probably very happy in that moment, I’m sure of it,” Clark said.
Because the box already weighed nearly 14 kg, Clark and her husband didn’t notice the extra weight from the “stowaway” cat when they sent the package through the mail on April 10th.
However, they quickly realized their shy cat had gone missing that same day. After days of searching around the house and neighborhood with no success, Clark began fearing the worst. Had Galena dashed outside unnoticed? Was she taken? Did something terrible happen by the river behind their home?
“We had no idea what had happened,” Clark recounted. “It was really challenging. I was heartbroken.”
Then she received the call from the vet in Riverside, California. An Amazon employee, Brandy Hunter, had taken Galena to the clinic, and the vet identified the cat through her microchip, allowing them to contact Clark.
Hunter wrote on Facebook that she received a call from her coworkers who had been unpacking a returned item and found a cat inside. “We’ve seen some pretty crazy things in this job, but nothing like this!” Hunter wrote. She drove to the warehouse to pick up the cat and care for her.
Amazon has not yet commented on the situation. According to the company, when returned products arrive at Amazon’s return center, they are inspected for damage or signs of use to determine if they can be resold.
After receiving the vet’s call, Clark and her husband quickly booked a flight to California. The next day, they arrived at the vet’s office and reunited with Galena. “When I held Galena, she stopped trembling and knew I was there. It was a truly magical moment,” Clark said.
