Christmas Miracles: After 2 Years, 2 Florida Cats Find Way Home

HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, FL — This is the tale of two city cats who were able to find their way home for the holidays this year after all hope was lost.

Eva

In September 2017, as Hurricane Irma roared toward Tampa Bay with 177 mph winds and 8-foot storm surge, residents hastily boarded up windows and hoarded gallons of water.

In the midst of all the disaster preparations, a friendly, gray tabby cat named Eva got out and slipped away from her home in northwest Hillsborough County, never to be seen again.

Until Christmas Eve.

That's when Eva showed up at the Hillsborough County Sheriff's District III office, 7202 Gunn Highway, and declared herself to be the sheriff's new K-Kitty.

Friendly and starved for attention, she began tagging along with sheriff's employees as they went about their daily tasks.

The deputies figured the cat belonged to a resident in a home or apartment. But, to be certain, Deputy Kate Kotfila decided to take the cat to a veterinarian to see if she was microchipped.

She was.

When Kotfila called the phone number of the registered owner to tell her that the cat was at the District III sheriff's office, she was surprised to learn that Eva had been missing since Hurricane Irma.

On Friday, Eva was reunited with her owner, who took photos of the cat as she promptly made herself at home in the pet bed she hadn't slept in for two years.

Eva's whereabouts between September 2017 and Dec. 24, 2019, remain a mystery. She certainly isn't talking.

Malachi

While the sheriff's office was responsible for reuniting Eva with her owner, it was another Hillsborough County agency that helped Malachi find his way back home.

Two years ago, Jaclyn Williams and her husband moved from Tampa to Portland, Oregon, to help start a church.

Although the Williamses adored their cat, Malachi, their tiny new apartment in Oregon didn't allow pets, so they found a woman in Tampa who agreed to take in Malachi.

Two years later, the Williamses have moved to more spacious accommodations in Oak Harbor, Washington, where Jaclyn received an email Dec. 9.

It was from the company that manufactured the microchip she had implanted in Malachi. The company told her that the cat had turned up at a Tampa veterinary clinic without an owner. And he now had a head tilt, possibly caused by neurological damage, that would make him difficult to put up for adoption.

"Did she want her cat back?" the company asked.

Williams was distressed when she learned Malachi was not living in the loving home she'd left him in, and she desperately wanted to get him back. But finding a way to transport a cat 3,000 miles away seemed impossible.

The veterinary clinic had turned Malachi over to the Hillsborough County Pet Resource Center, and Williams reached out to the center to see if it could help.

But the employees at the center were stumped. The center adopts out thousands of cats a year but has never sent a pet so far away. They didn't know how to begin to reunite Williams and Malachi.

Williams decided to turn to her 116 Facebook followers for ideas, explaining her "crazy situation" and asking if they knew anyone who could help.

Somehow, Williams' plea made it way to Texas resident Joy McDonald, a flight attendant for Southwest Airlines.

McDonald is a volunteer with the Southwest Animal Transport Team (SWATT), a group of nearly 2,000 current and former employees of Southwest Airlines who volunteer time to help rescue dogs and cats from shelters and fly them to their new adopted families.

With McDonald's help, on Dec. 17, Malachi and a member of SWATT living in Tampa boarded a plane at Tampa International Airport and crossed three time zones so Williams and Malachi could spend Christmas together.