Rescue stories like these certainly don’t come across every day, yet they actually happened, even if it’s hard to believe. Lost in nature, a little girl wandered for days and days in the wild woods of Siberia. If she returned home thanks to her faithful four-legged friend Naida.
Karina Chikitova was not even 4 years old when she disappeared in the summer of 2014. He was visiting some relatives in the remote village of Olom, in the Sakha region, in the company of his mother. One morning in July, however, Karina went out of the family home to play with Naida and never returned.
The mother and family raised the alarm, but the search began days later due to poor reception of the village public telephone signal and some misunderstandings. The police opened an investigation, activating the dog unit, the air ambulance and using drones to track down little Karina. Many volunteers joined the searches.
No one believed they would find the little girl alive. There are too many dangers out there, from the cold to wild predators like bears and wolves. The same men in uniform had difficulty searching the vegetation with the external temperatures and with numerous sightings of bears, How could such a small child have gotten by in those conditions?
Hope faded day after day until something unexpected occurred, breaking that deafening silence. The dog presumed to be with Karina at the time of her disappearance was spotted again in the village.
It was the animal that led the rescuers to Karina, about 6 km away from the village. Karina was spotted lying huddled in the tall grass, after 11 days with no results. The little girl had wounds on her body, but was alive.
Where she took shelter in the night in those almost two weeks, what she fed on and how she made it remains a mystery to this day. Many think that the dog protected her and warmed her when the sun went down.
Karina Chikitova today is no longer that little girl lost in Siberia. She is a girl with many passions and interests. She loves dance and continues to love animals. The sculptor Nikolai Chochchasov wanted to dedicate a statue to her in the Yakutsk airport square.
The sculpture pays homage to this uncommon story so as not to forget the little girl who many have nicknamed “Mowgli” and her brave dog.
