Earthquake: The Road To Recovery : Cat That Became a Symbol of Hope Dies

Tiffany, the cat whose tale of will and survival captured hearts as far away as Europe, died early Friday, her body wracked by the effects of malnutrition and dehydration.

The 10-year-old Persian mix was found Sunday, her body withered after spending 41 days locked with no food, only rainwater in the storage closet where she fled after the Jan. 17 earthquake.

The fact that she had survived the ordeal, something her veterinarians called highly unusual if not downright miraculous, had made her an international symbol of hope. Calls from newspapers in London and Germany poured into the Animal Clinic of Santa Clarita, where she had been recovering. CBS News was at the clinic preparing to do a live report when the cat went into cardiac and respiratory arrest early Friday.

Veterinarian Sandy Sanford had checked Tiffany at 2:45 a.m. before returning to unlock the clinic doors for the CBS crew about an hour later. Tiffany’s body started to shut down about 4 a.m. as fluid seeped into her chest, Sanford said.

The veterinarian spent 20 minutes trying to save her with cardiopulmonary resuscitation, oxygen and drug therapy. But the cat, who had lost about 60% of her body weight in her ordeal, didn’t respond.

“In the back of my mind I knew this was a potential complication,” Sanford said. “But I was hoping, since she’d gone this long, I was hoping she would make it. . . . It’s a crummy day.”

Tiffany’s owner, Laurie Booth, was on her way to meet the CBS crew and arrived at the veterinary clinic minutes after Sanford stopped trying to revive the cat at 4:21 a.m.

Booth remained distraught Friday, blaming herself for Tiffany’s fate and questioning how the cat could have been so close--in her neighbor’s storage closet--and not have been found.

“I feel like it’s my fault because I never heard her cry, because she was so close but I didn’t hear anything,” she said. “I kept calling ‘Tiffany!’ She was right there all the time, probably praying I would open the door, and I was praying I would find her. It’s just bothering me so much.”

But Booth was thankful that she’d found Tiffany alive.

“She didn’t die alone in a cold place. She knew she was loved,” Booth said. “She definitely was a little fighter.”

After Tiffany is cremated, Booth will keep her ashes in her living room. But Booth, who has two other cats, has no plans to replace the cat she found abandoned in Riverside five years ago.

“I don’t want to get another kitten,” she said, explaining that when she ran newspaper advertisements in her search for the cat, a woman offered to give her a Persian, who, like Tiffany, was gray with white paws.

But Booth wasn’t interested. “I called and told her there was only one Tiffany.”