Laundry Pods Save Life of Raccoon Stuck in a Mass. Storm Drain – ryan

A police department in Massachusetts is celebrating a successful “raccoon rescue” made possible by a Good Samaritan and laundry detergent pods.

On Monday, April 14, officers with the Holyoke Police Department (HPD) stepped in after Fernando Rivera Jr. spotted a raccoon “stuck in a storm drain” in Heritage Park and called authorities for help freeing the wild animal.

The department shared a photo from the rescue on Facebook the following day, showing the tiny nocturnal mammal with its face uncomfortably scrunched into the hole of a storm drain.

HPD officers removed the storm drain, but the quick fix wasn’t enough, as the raccoon remained stuck in the hole. Then, Rivera had another idea.

“Mr. Rivera opened two laundry pods and used them to lubricate the raccoon’s head,” the department wrote on Facebook.

After roughly 20 minutes of trying, the officers finally freed the raccoon, which animal control soon “retrieved” from police. “We would like to thank Mr. Rivera for getting the animal in distress the help that it needed,” the HPD wrote in its post, sharing an image of a man holding the raccoon wrapped up in a blanket.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

The now-rescued critter isn’t the only one to find itself in a strange position in the past year. Raccoons were recently spotted during chicken-coop video tours and dropping through the ceiling at New York’s LaGuardia Airport.

It also isn’t the first raccoon to be rescued by an agency in Massachusetts. In September 2022, the Cape Wildlife Center in Barnstable, Massachusetts, announced on Facebook that a local homeowner spotted a raccoon with a peanut butter jar stuck over its head and alerted authorities.

After the raccoon fled to the woods and led rescuers on “a difficult game of hide-and-seek,” the team braved thorns and rough trails the following day and used grabbers to pry the jar off the raccoon’s head.

“The raccoon stuck his head out for a breath of fresh air before returning to the safety of his den. Luckily, the jar hadn’t caused any trauma to his neck,” Cape Wildlife Center wrote on social media at the time, before encouraging locals to dispose of jars properly.