06/12/2025
Simba’s Great Escape
Here is an incredible story about why microchipping your pets is so important, especially when traveling with them!
Anna Waldbillig was travelling with her cat, Simba, from Yuma, Arizona to Edmonton in April. She spent the night in Banning, California the night before her flight home from the Palm Springs Airport. Around supper time, Simba escaped from the hotel room. Anna and her party searched most of the night for Simba but did not find him. In the morning, Anna contacted her daughter who had a Bluetooth tracker app on her phone which could track Simba’s Bluetooth device. The app tracked him to a location a couple of blocks away from the hotel )on the other side of the freeway). Anna and her friend looked for the cat but could not find him. The Bluetooth tracker would not update so they could not be positive where Simba was. Finally Anna and the rest of her group had to go to the airport to catch their flight home and they were faced with the difficult decision to leave Simba behind. I (Anna) would have stayed in Banning to keep looking for Simba but I left my phone in Yuma and did not know if there were any car rentals in Banning.
Anna’s daughter went online to try to locate an animal shelter in the community of Banning to see if they could help with the search of Simba. Simba was chipped so if he was found, a vet could check the chip for the contact information for Simba in order to reunite him with his family. Unfortunately she discovered that there was no animal shelter located in the community. Then she turned to social media, discovering that there was a page for lost pets in Banning, California. She created a post online asking for people’s help to find Simba.
The response was remarkable. Total strangers 35 to 40 people in this community went out, looking for Simba at his last known location. A community Animal Protection Worker contacted Anna’s daughter by phone, offering to help search for Simba. Others contacted Anna’s daughter offering advice on how to entice Simba to a live trap. One woman even offered to go out at dark to plant a couple of live traps, hoping to catch Simba. Later in the day, a woman on the site shared a picture from a Ring doorbell camera that someone had posed on a different site, with a picture of a cat wearing a harness which was hiding under a vehicle. Anna’s daughter verified that this was Simba. This picture helped as he wore his harness to make it easier for people to identify him.
Finally in the late afternoon after the day after Simba went missing, a woman and her children who had gone out looking for Simba, found him. She contacted Anna’s daughter and then agreed to take Simba home until Anna’s daughter could arrange for someone to come from Yuma, Arizona to pick up Simba. Two couples from Yuma offered which is a hour drive one way. The next day one couple picked up Simba, took him back to Yuma and kept him at there place until Anna was able to come and pick him up. People were so kind and helpful. I thought I had lost my fur baby.
A few days later, Anna and a friend travelled back to Yuma and were reunited with Simba. They then went back to Palm Springs and flew with him to Edmonton.
