30 November,2011 09:14 AM IST | | Agencies
When a British woman's dog vanished from the driveway five years ago she soon gave up hope of seeing the pet again.
As the days went by without any sighting of seven-year-old T-Bone, Pat Oates concluded the bull terrier had been stolen.
So she was astonished and overjoyed to be told last week that the dog had been found five years onu00a0-- riding on a local bus.
The bus driver took the animal to a local veterinary surgery, where staff were able to reunite Oates with her long-lost pet, now aged 12, after scanning his microchip.
On Monday Oates, a delivery driver, said, "We couldn't believe it when we got the phone call. I thought the vet was joking. I broke down crying. We're over the moon to have him back, we thought he was gone for good."
The mother-of-three said it was a mystery how the dog came to be travelling on the number 37 bus, operated by Travel West Midlands.
But she said it was no surprise he had been found on a bus, as the dog always enjoyed going on car journeys with the family. Oates said T-Bone had been neglected and was suffering with a cyst on his leg.
