A Lincoln County boy and his dog are safe at home this morning after spending a little more than three hours stuck in a dry well Monday night.
Gabe Allbritton, 4, apparently fell into a 23-foot-deep well on Gene Road just west of Bogue Chitto around 5 p.m. after he heard his dog, a poodle-mix, bark and went to look for it, according to Lincoln County Civil Defense Director Clifford Galey.
“Just from what we can put together, he was walking through the yard and heard the dog bark and turned around and tried to find it,” he said.
The dog had been missing for three days and had fallen in the well, too.
Galey said Allbritton’s mother saw the boy fall in.
McComb Fire Chief Stephen Adams said he sent manpower and equipment to the scene, acting on a request by Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.
“The well was washed out in the bottom, so the child was able to move around the base of it,” he said.
Adams said given the circumstances, the boy’s ordeal could have been much worse.
“I’ve seen those same kind of operations last for days,” he said. “We were able to get some fresh air down the hole to him, plus the puppy had been in there about three days so we knew it was survivable. It was a matter of getting set up and getting the right equipment in there.”
Allbritton, who appeared to have had no injuries at the scene, went to King’s Daughters Medical Center in Brookhaven as a precautionary measure, Adams said.
Adams said since the well was only about 12 to 14 inches in diameter, and there was resistance to break Allbritton’s fall.
“It wasn’t like a free-fall,” he said. “The good thing is there was an open area in the base of the well and he was able to move around a little bit.”
Rescue personnel put a camera down the well to better enhance their vision of the rope, Allbritton and his dog.
“We got the puppy out immediately after we got the boy out,” Adams said.
Lincoln County Sheriff Steve Rushing said Allbritton’s dog went missing earlier in the week, but no one in the family realized there was an open well nearby.
Galey said MEMA is working today to get the hole filled in.
“We covered the well last night and secured it,” he said.
“He was just a tough little fellow,” Galey said. “It was a blessing.”
Rushing said Allbritton was scared at the scene, but more than anything, he was just ready to be with his family again.
“It took us roughly three hours, but they got a good report,” he said. “He was just ready to get out of the hole.”
Rushing said this is the first occurrence he has seen in 19 years at the sheriff’s department.
Galey said he can’t thank everyone who responded enough — “to all the folks who responded from volunteers to the general public who brought equipment,” he said.
Rushing said all of the local fire departments, MEMA, the sheriff’s office, civil defense and members from the community came together to offer help and support.
“They were very fortunate to keep working with him and get him strapped so they could pull him up,” he said.
