Cat miraculously survives nine days under rubble after Kentucky tornado

• Sonny “Hoot” Gibson had almost given up hope of finding their beloved cat after a deadly tornado — until he heard a faint meow amid the rubble.
• Madix miraculously survived getting trapped underneath the chaos for nine days!
• Hoot said that Madix might have used eight of his nine lives to survive the ordeal.

Earlier this month, a severe storm system and tornado outbreak devastated several states, including Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Mississippi, and Tennessee. Amid all the chaos caused by the deadly tornado, a beloved cat thought to be lost forever was miraculously found alive nine days after the disaster.

Sonny “Hoot” Gibson and his family have been helping out with the cleanup days after the tornado.

Their three-story office building in downtown Mayfield was among the buildings that were completely destroyed. Their beloved office cat, Madix, has been missing for over a week now, and they have just about given up hope of finding him.

But when Hoot returned to their building on Sunday, he heard a faint meow amid the rubble.

“Out of the blue, I heard that meow,” he told WTVF. “When I heard it, and I said his name, and I heard it faintly again, I knew it was him.”

“My knees got so weak, my chest almost got tight. I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m going to have a heart attack here.’ I was blown away,” he shared.

He enlisted the help of two employees to look through the wreckage. They found the cat in a pocket under the rocks. Fortunately, he was uninjured and cleared by the vet.

Hoot quickly took Madix home, where he devoured “three bowls of food and drank a whole bowl of water.” He’s now settling into his new life as a house cat.

Hoot recalled, “It was just an incredible feeling to put him in my arms. If cats actually have nine lives, he probably used up about eight of them in that nine-day period.”

Source: PEOPLE