Seth Meyer/Nevada Appeal Shanon Shamblin of the Brake Team in Carson City holds a kitten he rescued from traffic on Highway 395. Shamblin believes the kitten, whose paws and fur are singed, was displaced by the fire and wandered out of the hills on Wednesday.
A frightened, emaciated kitten with burned paws ran down a mountain, through traffic and into the safe, greasy arms of a car mechanic, proving he really does have nine lives.
Sparky the kitten came out of a mountainous area burned by the Waterfall fire, ran through the parking lot of the Brake Team shop on Carson Street late Wednesday afternoon - straight into the middle of traffic.
He made it to the center divider and froze.
"He was scared to death," mechanic Shanon Shamblin said, cradling the cat in his arms.
Shamblin stopped traffic to get to Sparky, scooped the shaking cat into his arms, and brought him back to the garage.
"I put him in over in the corner at first, but he kept meowing and meowing," Shamblin said. "He just wanted to be around us while we worked."
Shamblin put Sparky into an open, oversized toolbox, where the cat quieted down and licked its burned paws.
Shamblin and his manager Steve Orlando marveled over the cat's survival of what appeared to be burns from the Waterfall fire - three weeks ago.
"He must have been living up there all this time," Orlando said. "It's amazing."
The men asked customer Kristi Holetz of Incline if she wanted the cat, and she returned with cat food, kitty litter and a plan to take Sparky to the Pet Network, a private cat adoption facility in Incline.
Pet Network Executive Director Jessica Solberg said Sparky's homeless days are over.
"He'll be very well taken care of," Solberg said. "We'll make sure he goes to a very good home."
