MAC, the 'international terrier', has jetted from Newton-le-Willows to his new home in Kansas City. But not without an airport episode of high drama.

I've now had a happy update on the progress of the lively Jack Russell pet from Pam White who adopted him following the death, some months ago, of her father, retired Chief Inspector Wilf Beuden.

Wilf was once the long-serving police chief and later High Street tobacconist in Newton. And Pam, an old friend of mine from way back, who runs a successful tourism concern in the US, now writes: "You will be glad to hear that Mac has adapted wonderfully and is happily chasing Yankee squirrels and jack-rabbits bigger than himself."

It was after her dad's funeral that Pam announced that Mac would be emigrating after all the necessary documentation was taken care of. But the switch was not without incident.

"His arrival in the US was quite spectacular," she writes. "We were late into Atlanta from Manchester. Mac was put in a crate and breezed through customs." But then he went missing among the baggage. Pam was told that the flight must leave without the little dog.

"I got off the plane and was sobbing hysterically (not a pretty sight!) as I passed the cockpit." Pam spluttered out the tale about her missing Mac to the perplexed pilot. "Then I stood in the jetway watching the plane taxi away." A fraught Pam was just about aware of a young Delta supervisor muttering into his walkie-talkie: "I have an hysterical female passenger and a missing international dog. I need help . . . right now!" Then, wonder of wonders, across the runway came Mac, his crate balanced on an electric cart.

There was a yell of "Here comes the dog, here comes the dog!" The Delta pilots spotted the crate and, although pretty far out, taxied back . . . ""pilots with a heart."

Writes Pam, who keeps in touch with this page on the Internet: "Mac went into the hold and I went back on board as the passengers stood to cheer and applaud. Quite an entrance into the USA; and after 14 hours confined to that crate, Mac was finally released in Kansas City, jumping out like he'd just been on a trip down to Earlestown.

"I'd heard that Jack Russells were pretty tough and this was proof of it."

There are few of his breed in Kansas. "When I take Mac for a walk," says Pam, "he gets a lot of attention, everyone stopping to ask me what sort of dog he is. An International Dog, I always tell them!"

IT'S a comfort for Pam to have this four-pawed link with her late dad and the Newton she was raised in . .

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