CURIOSITY may not have killed this cat - but it did mean he got covered in cooking oil and had to be rescued by two fire crews!

A big cat hunt was sparked by the little cat, which staged a disappearing act after being left on his own for just one hour.

Zac, a fluffy 12-week-old silver tabby, vanished without trace and owner Samantha Leppard spent hours searching the streets around her Hounsdown home.

The kitten was eventually discovered trapped in the gap between the floor of Samantha's flat, and the ceiling of the flat below.

She said: "It was about 1.30am and I had been out for hours looking for him when my downstairs neighbours said they could hear him mewing."

But try as they might Samantha and her neighbours Kelly Leighton and Bernice Everett couldn't work out where he was or how he got there.

Samantha, 27, an administrator at Nightfreight, said: "It was really frustrating. We could hear him, but couldn't see him."

Zac had wriggled his way behind a kitchen unit in Samantha's Parkside flat and through a central heating duct, ending up stuck between two floors.

Firefighters from Totton and St Mary's arrived at the scene just before 2am and spent two hours trying to find the missing kitty.

Eventually little Zac was traced using thermal-imaging cameras and was removed through the ceiling of a ground-floor flat, which had to be cut to get to him.

Two crews and two fire engines were involved in the rescue operation.

First a furry paw was spotted, then a pair of hazel eyes, but the problems of freeing the kitten were far from over.

Although tiny, Zac was a little bit too big to squeeze out of the gap made for him.

And so, to ease him through the aperture, he was covered in cooking oil like an oven-ready chicken. The slippery prisoner was then gently pulled from his hiding place.

Leading firefighter Barry Rowe, of St Mary's, said: "He was a pretty little thing and none the worse for his ordeal."

Neighbour Bernice, 43, a transport administrator for Blue Band Express, said: "When he popped his little head out he just looked at us all as if to say, 'What's the fuss all about'"

Samantha said: "I was only saying the other day what lengths Zac will go to grab attention."

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