SEPTA workers found a mother cat and five kittens at the 63rd Street Station on the Market-Frankford Line. A cat was found in the ceiling on Monday and the others were found Tuesday, SEPTA officials said.
A mother cat and her five kittens have been rescued after being pulled from the ceiling and walls of SEPTA's 63rd Street Station on the Market-Frankford Line.
According to SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch, the animals were initially discovered on Monday, at about 6 p.m., when a SEPTA supervisor learned that cats were reportedly inside walls or the ceiling at the 63rd Street Station.
After working for "several hours," Busch said SEPTA employees were about to pull one kitten from the ceiling at the station.
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But, he said, at the time, that was all they could find.
Then, on Tuesday afternoon, a SEPTA employee scoured the same location and was able to find another two kittens in the wall, along with the cats' mother.
Tuesday evening, another two kittens were found, Busch said in a statement.
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All five kittens and the mother were reunited and, Busch said, they were delivered to the Stray Cat Relief Fund of Philadelphia.
Representatives from the relief fund said, in a statement to NBC10, that the person who reported the animals to SEPTA said that the mother cat had been abandoned in the neighborhood and "we suspect chose to give birth in the station behind a wall along the staircase."
"They were in that wall and into the ceiling somehow as well. SEPTA workers spent days and long hours trying to get the kittens to safety," a representative from the Stray Cat Relief Fund said.
According to the relief fund, rescuers decided to name the mother cat "Joan" after Joan Woollcott, the first female trolley operator for SEPTA.
The kittens are around three weeks old, and the rescuers said that they are still nursing and should remain with their mom.
One SEPTA employee had taken three of the kittens home to care for them, but representatives at the relief fund said the cats have all been reunited.
So far, rescuers have named the kittens: Tyler (after one of the SEPTA rescuers), Trollie and Westbound.
The remaining kittens have yet to be named, rescuers said.
The animals will be up for adoption in a few months and in the meanwhile, rescuers said, they are looking for a permanent foster home.
For details on how to foster or to learn more about the Stray Cat Relief Fund, visit their website, here.
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