They say that a dog is man’s best friend and like most other people that I know I‘m quite fond of dogs, but there is a limit, especially when you are putting your own life in danger to help a dog. The recent really cold weather has brought the usual spate of frozen ponds and lakes and tragically it has also seen the death of a man, that it was believed was trying to rescue a dog from a frozen pond, at a golf club in Surrey.  The person concerned was a classic car enthusiast called Tim Waddingham who restored and serviced classic Jaguar cars and also raced them.
 
I have a particular fondness for Jaguar cars through a friend of mine who restored and ran a Jaguar XK120. My friend was a member of the Jaguar Enthusiasts Club as was Tim Waddingham and I attended many meetings. I never met Tim but I watched his friend Terry Dye with whom Tim raced and he recalled how Tim had stopped racing after a few years but still used to come to the circuits. Mr Dye described him as “a quiet man with a very subtle sense of humour” and added “he restored the car that he raced and it was beautifully prepared.”

Someone who also rescued a dog but was lucky to survive the act was a man who stripped down to his underwear and crawled across a frozen river to rescue his trapped dog and in my opinion has rightly been condemned by fire-fighters. According to an eyewitness, the man fell into the River Stour, in Dedham, Essex, on Sunday but managed to climb out with the animal. Ice often appears to be strong but in reality it can be very thin and anyone who falls through into the water below could get trapped under the ice and would only be able to survive for minutes in the freezing water. So is it worth risking your life to try to follow a dog onto the ice, normally they will make it back to safety anyway, the same cannot be said for people.