Dramatic moment drowning red deer is saved from a frozen river

These are the images of the touching rescue of a red deer that was taken out of a frozen river in Siberia.

MSN reports that a red deer was rescued from a frozen river in Siberia after local hunters saw the creature fighting in the icy water.

The video posted on YouTube show a red deer that barely manages to keep its head above water in a frozen river in Barguzin near Ulan-Ude, east of Siberia, Russia.

The deer was totally weakened by the extreme cold; it was also a large specimen, so getting it out of the water was not an easy task for the brave hunters. Read more on our Twitter account @amomama_usa

Four men worked together to open a clear way for the deer and remove it from the river in an effort that lasted more than four hours. You can listen to the cameraman Aleksej Baluev, who says: "We need to get him away from the cold."

After they managed to remove the animal from the frozen water, the rescue team immediately began to rub the deer to try to restore the circulation of the frozen animal's blood, before heating it with a fire.

Finally, it was decided that the deer should be taken to the city so that it could dry up and recover, so it was moved to the nearest town.

Once placed in a local garage, the animal was fed a piece of lard and a cup of vodka, "to warm it up from the inside," Baluev said.

Finally, after recovering enough to stand up and being sufficiently strong to move freely, the kind locals released the deer, which ran gratefully into the forest.

The rescue effort occurred after Aleksej Baluev received a call about the animal that was drowning in the river and decided to organize a rescue team, composed of workers from the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations, veterinarians and local volunteers.

A similar story happened with another deer that was rescued from a lake after enduring 24 hours immersed in the frozen water. This was rescued by two search and rescue volunteers (SAR) from Kamloops who used extreme caution on the fragile ice.

Mike Ritcey received a call on December 3 from a woman who had noticed the deer at Lake Tunkwa and feared he was stuck. The volunteer felt that he should go and check what happened to the deer, although it is not usually the work of SAR rescuers.

This story reminds us of another deer that was deprived of food and water for several days because of the terrible situation it had got itself into.

A local in the Colts Neck area spotted the deer in his backyard, which looked quite abnormal in the head. Upon closer inspection, he realized that it was an animal that was in the dire need of his help because it had got its head stuck in a glass globe.