Baltimore Humane Society to Honor Baltimore Police Marine Unit

The Baltimore Humane Society (BHS) will honor the Baltimore Police Department (BPD) Marine Unit, for their heroic cold water rescue of a dog named Penny.  The ceremony will take place at the Shelter building on the grounds of BHS.  The event is open to the public.

On December 29, 2010, at about 6:30pm, the BPD Marine Unit (Sergeant Michael Kain, Officer William Edgar, Officer John [Americus] Rambeau, and Officer John Wagner) arrived by boat to the scene of what was to become a brave dog rescue from the freezing waters of the Inner Harbor. Penny, a black Labrador mix, was rescued from a pier in the Inner Harbor after she ran out of her Federal Hill home, crossed the four lanes of Key Highway, and jumped into the cold water.

At first, Penny was hesitant to let the men get close, but after Officer Rambeau was in the water, she allowed him to get close enough to help her. Per Officer Rambeau’s statement to the Baltimore Sun, “she was happy to have someone to hang onto.”

After Officer Rambeau got her safely ashore, she was taken by animal control to their facility for treatment for “cold-water exposure and hypothermia,” said Detective Jeremy Silbert, a spokesman for the BPD Marine Unit.

The BPD Marine Unit has said that the waters were cold and it was hard to see her in the cover of night, but it would have been the “wrong thing to turn their back.” For this heroic effort, BHS is honoring their unit.