Cat hitches ride to Alaska in mattress, reunites with family

“We just assumed he had run away, which was very unlike Moosie,” Kymberly Chelf said. “He’s just a very loyal, loving cat.”

A moving company left with their belongings, but the Chelfs spent three more days in Texas searching for their feline friend.

Turns out, Moosie was already en route to Alaska some 3,700 road miles away — inside a futon mattress in the moving truck.

The couple was reunited with the cat when the family’s belongings arrived in Fairbanks last week. After the movers unwrapped the mattress and carried it upstairs, the cat emerged with a meow.

“He’d given it everything he had to let us know he was in there,” Kymberly Chelf said. “It just broke my heart.”

Kymberly Chelf said they rushed Moosie to a veterinary hospital, where he was rehydrated and spent hours in surgery and received a blood transfusion.

It also turns out Moosie is no stranger to adversity. He was a newborn kitten when he and his siblings were rescued from the wall of a home owned by a neighbor of the Chelfs, who ended up adopting Moosie. The feline mother had become tangled in wires and died.

After Moosie’s latest brush with danger, his owners spent several thousand dollars in veterinarian bills to get him ready to return home soon.

“It’s unbelievable, but we are so glad to have him alive, and we can’t wait for him to come back home,” Kymberly Chelf said. “It’s a long road to recovery for him, but we’re looking forward to having him back and getting him nice and fat again.”