Watch: Nurse performs CPR on drunk raccoon trapped in moonshine-filled dumpster

A routine day at the Letcher County Health Department turned into an unexpected animal rescue when fermented peaches left in a nearby dumpster created a perilous situation for a family of raccoons.

“I've had some pretty crazy days on the job, but nothing like this,” said Misty Combs, a registered nurse with 21 years of experience at the Health Department in Whitesburg, according to the LEX18 website.

Watch the full video posted by the Breaking911 X account.


“Our health department is right beside Kentucky Mist Moonshine, a distillery, and they had put some fermented peaches in their dumpster, and I guess the baby raccoons had gotten in the dumpster and they were stuck,” Combs explained.

Last week, Combs and her coworkers noticed a frantic raccoon running across the parking lot, followed by commotion coming from a dumpster next door. Combs realized the mother raccoon was desperate to reach her babies. “I was like, 'We have to get them out!' It was the motherly instinct in me because I saw that momma and she was trying so hard to get her babies back and she didn't know what to do.”

She scooped the first baby raccoon out with a shovel, which immediately ran to join its mother. The second, however, was lying face down at the bottom of the dumpster, surrounded by water and fermented peaches soaked in moonshine.

Without hesitation, Combs grabbed the raccoon by the tail and pulled it to safety, only to find it had passed out.

“Everybody around was like ‘It's dead, it's not breathing.’ It had drowned, and it was full of water, you could feel the water, so immediately, I just started doing CPR on it.” A coworker captured video of Combs performing chest compressions and slapping the raccoon’s back. Though she had never given CPR to an animal before, she acted quickly to save its life.

Suddenly, the raccoon started breathing. “The entire time, I was afraid it'd come to and eat me up, and raccoons carry rabies so I was afraid of that,” Combs admitted. Wildlife officials arrived before the situation could escalate and took the raccoon to a local veterinarian for fluids and care to sober it up.

Combs and her coworkers named the young raccoon Otis Campbell after the iconic character from The Andy Griffith Show. Eventually, Otis was returned to the Health Department parking lot, where Combs had the honor of releasing him back into the wild.