A heartless animal tossed a poor pooch off the BQE in Greenpoint — but the tough pup survived the 30 foot fall, thanks to quick-thinking witnesses.
Jon Ernsberger spotted the pitbull falling head-first near Meeker Avenue in Greenpoint, so he slammed on his car breaks to help at around 6:25 p.m on Tuesday, he said.
“I thought for sure it would be dead. It had blood coming out of its mouth. It tried to stand up and it was whimpering,” he told The Post.
Several other people rushed to help the sweet 75-pound pooch, who was panting and struggling to move, witnesses said.
They offered him water and blankets then used a makeshift stretcher out of several poster boards to load him into Ernsberger’s car, witnesses said.
“When I showed up, he was just breathing really heavily not making any noise…It looked like impact had broken his bones, ” said Lacie Zassman, a 24-year-old preschool teacher, who spotted the i dog while walking home from work.
“I couldn’t believe someone would do something so cruel and disturbing,” she said.
Zassman and Ernsberger rushed the pooch to the Veterinary Emergency & Referral Group in Cobble Hill, where he was treated for a lung problem and an injured front leg, a rep from the clinic told Gothamist, which first reported the story.
He is in stable condition.
Workers at the clinic have since named him Meeker and were feeding him scraps of turkey on Wednesday.
“He’s sore, definitely from landing. Fortunately he didn’t sustain any broken bones… He’s getting a lot of love here. He’s a really sweet dog,” said Dr. Brett Levitzke of VERG.
During the chaos, Zassman said one cop offered to take the dog to a kill shelter.
Other animal hospitals refused to help him without a police report, she said, according to Gothamist, which first reported the story.
Despite the trauma, the dog has a positive attitude and is getting plenty of rest.
“He really was such a sweetheart he had no aggression in him whatsoever… I hope he finds a good home, Zassman said.
Ernsberger added, “ I think people are going to come out of the woodwork to adopt him, especially considering how good of a personality he has.”
He added, “I can’t imaging the psychology of the person who threw him. I don’t want to believe it.”
The dog had no collar and wasn’t micro-chipped, witnesses said.
The police officers who arrived at the scene claimed nobody was there when they showed up.
It’s unclear if cops are searching for the person who threw the dog.
-Additional reporting by Dana Sauchelli