MONROE, Wash. — A missing Minnesota cat is found more than 1,500 miles away in Monroe nearly two months after he disappeared.
‘Finn’ the cat had gone missing from Middle River, Minnesota in early July.
“Finn was found in a very industrial part of Monroe where we were not really sure how he ended up there,” said Stephane Miotke.
Miotke says she was driving down a side street that she doesn’t usually take. Finn was found sitting in the middle of the road holding up traffic.
“I scooped him up and he started purring immediately and I’m like okay, you are not supposed to be here. There’s no houses there’s no apartment nothing around,” Miotke explained.
With a harness and microchip on, her first instinct was figure out where he came from. When she had his chip scanned, it notified his owner immediately.
“Put the chip number into Petfinder, whichever website it was and they’re like – oh, his name is Finn. You know, he’s this many years old, weighs this much and owner called me nine minutes later,” Miotke said.
More than 1,500 miles away, Lea Hasbargen got the call that her fur baby Finn was found.
“I was just so happy he was alive, and you know, someone found him until she was like, Oh, he’s in Washington. I was like, wait – what?”
Hasbargen couldn’t believe he ended up all the way in Western Washington.
“I looked for him every night. I called for him and he just wasn’t coming back. And so, I was kind of losing hope,” Hasbargen said.
Hasbargen told KIRO 7 Finn went missing from their Minnesota home about two months ago. She says he’s an indoor-outdoor cat that never strayed far from home.
“I think it’s like two miles from our house. So, he might’ve just wandered off and, or she might’ve found him on the road or something,” she explained.
She believes that someone who thought he was a stray picked him a few miles from her house. The person went to Washington and Finn was along for the ride.
It seems like he had escaped again until he was found in Monroe.
Hasbargen says she’s glad that it was Miotke who took him in.
“My heart is just, like, screaming of joy for how, how amazing she treats him. And she sends me videos every day and pictures and makes me so excited to see him,” Hasbargen explained.
When Finn finally makes the journey back home, Hasburgen says he’ll strictly be an inside cat.
“We have already been making plans. He might get his own room. He is very much becoming an indoor cat. Very much won’t leave my sight,” she said.
They’re working to arrange a flight back to Minnesota for Finn as soon as possible.
Hasburgen and Miotke couldn’t stress enough how important it is to get your pet chipped if they aren’t.
“If you want your kitty home 1,500 miles away eight weeks you might get that chance if you put [a chip] in your pet,” said Miotke.
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