A golden retriever known as “The Hugging Dog” on Instagram now needs all the love she can get after a Christmas Day fire in Chelsea left her owner homeless.
“I am numb. I’m numb. I lost everything,” Louboutina’s devastated owner Cesar Fernandez-Chavez, 46, said outside a Manhattan Red Cross center on Tuesday following Monday’s three-alarm fire.The 3:30 p.m. blaze at West 19th Street near Seventh Avenue, which was ruled accidental, was ignited by unattended candles on the top floor of the six-story building, FDNY officials said Tuesday.
Strong winds were also a factor in the raging fire, in which a resident and a firefighter were left with minor injuries, officials said.
Fernandez-Chavez had taken the affectionate pooch — who has more than 189,000 Instagram followers — out for a walk to a nearby CVS minutes before the fire broke out in the apartment next door.
“I was going to leave Loubie [at home]. If I did that, Louboutina would be gone now,” said Fernandez-Chavez, adding that he usually walks the 6-year-old dog at 5 p.m.
He and Louboutina had reached the corner of the block when he saw flames shooting out of the windows.
Fernandez-Chavez, speaking through tears, said if he had lost the pooch in the blaze, “I would be on a psych floor right now, because I wouldn’t be able to handle that.”
He slept on a friend’s couch Monday night with his dog and is now being put up in an area hotel by the Red Cross.
When he re-entered the fire-ravaged apartment where he’s lived for the past six years, Fernandez-Chavez discovered “my apartment was flooded . . . I could see Loubie’s toys swimming in the water.”
He lost all of his possessions in the blaze, but managed to salvage his passport out of a drawer in case he needs to head home to his native Peru.
“I lost a lot of memories, a lot of pictures, drawings of Loubie that were done by fans . . . so a lot of sentimental value . . . it hurts me,” he said.
Louboutina is known for standing on her hind legs and giving hugs to strangers on Big Apple street corners.
A GoFundMe page started on behalf of Fernandez-Chavez and the hugging dog quickly exceeded its goal of $20,000.
As of Tuesday night, more than $44,800 has been raised to help Fernandez-Chavez and his four-legged companion get back on their feet.
“Seeing all the feedback that we’re getting from all of her followers — it’s huge,” he said.
Though Fernandez-Chavez is currently homeless, he said having Loubie “means everything. She is the one that is keeping me stabilized right now.”
Additional reporting by Gina Daidone