The owner of a drain-cleaning company in Kamloops, B.C., can now add kitten rescuer to his resumé.

Dan Groess, owner of A Groess Underground sewer and drain services, responded to a call Monday afternoon about a tiny black cat stuck in an underground pipe.

His seven-year-old daughter Ariana came along on the rescue mission.

"We raced up there as quickly as we could and put a camera down there to see what we were dealing with," Groess said. "Sure enough, about 10 metres down the line, we saw a kitten down there."

To his surprise, the kitten began following the camera up the pipe.

Ariana helped her father with the equipment and made mewing noises to help entice the kitten out, she told Shelley Joyce, the host of CBC's Daybreak Kamloops.

When the pipe became too steep for the cat to move forward, Groess tied an old T-shirt onto the end of the camera and the cooperative kitten grabbed hold with its claws.

"I slowly pulled the camera out and, dangling at the bottom of my camera head was a kitten," he said.

Dan Groess says the kitten came out of the pipe hot, hungry and thirsty, but otherwise OK and is now recovering well. (Dan Groess)

Curiosity and the cat

He estimated the cat had been down there for several days.

Other than being hot, hungry and thirsty, the kitten — named Midnight — was otherwise OK.

Midnight is now at the local SPCA animal shelter but Groess and his daughter are looking into fostering the cat until it finds a home.

"We just feel so excited to be a part of this rescue mission. It just makes us happy inside that we were able to help," he said.

With files from Yvette Brend and Daybreak Kamloops.

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