Mystic - Harabe, an exotic Savannah cat, may have used up a few of his nine lives this week.

The 15-week-old kitten, a Serval-Bengal mix, was a passenger in a car that rolled over Tuesday night on Interstate 95 in the area of the Pequot Trail overpass.

When emergency crews arrived, the driver, Christopher Dacunto of Martha's Vineyard, Mass., was desperately looking for Harabe, who was nowhere to be found.

But the kitten turned up unharmed a day later - after riding away from the crash scene in the rear suspension system of an Old Mystic firetruck that traveled about eight miles back to the firehouse on Cow Hill Road.

Harabe went undetected, though, until the next morning, when the fire department office manager heard meowing noises coming from the truck.

"We were teasing her and telling her that maybe she was hitting the eggnog a little too hard," Fire Chief Ken Richards said. "But the guys started to hear it, too, and when they looked underneath the engine, the cat just hopped down."

Richards at first thought Harabe was a feral cat, but then he remembered that when firefighters responded to the crash scene Tuesday night, the driver of the Volvo was frantically looking for his cat.

"His nails were trimmed, so I just knew that he had to belong to somebody," said Richards.

Capt. Christopher Clarkin, a responder to the accident scene, said the car had landed on its roof and was severely damaged.

"When the guy asked us if we had seen his cat, we looked around and didn't find anything," said Clarkin. "I really didn't think the cat had survived."

On Wednesday Richards left a message for Dacunto, telling him he thought his cat had been found.

Richards said Dacunto called him late that night at his home and, after hearing a description of the cat staying at the firehouse, confirmed it was Harabe.

Dacunto and his father, Vincent, were reunited with Harabe Thursday morning at the firehouse.

While Harabe waited for his owner, he walked around the firehouse, jumped on desks, swatted plants and hopped on recycling bins.

Harabe meowed when he saw his owner. Dacunto's eyes welled with tears.

"Thank you, thank you," he repeated over and over again to the firefighters.

"This is just unbelievable," Vincent Dacunto said. "I couldn't believe they found the cat."

Christopher Dacunto said that on Tuesday he took his eyes off the road for a second when he hit a snow pile. He was on his way to his father's house in Hamden to spend the holidays.

Dacunto had had the kitten, which is an expensive and exotic breed, for just one week. He said he's planning to get a female cat next month so he can breed the pair.

Father and son returned to the crash site Wednesday to search for the cat. Dacunto said he followed small tracks he found in the woods, hoping they belonged to Harabe. They posted signs all over the area, hoping that someone would spot the cat.

On Thursday, on their way to pick up the kitten, the decidedly happier pair stopped at Petco in Waterford to buy supplies, including a traveling crate.

As the Dacuntos walked out of the chief's office with Harabe, Vincent turned to his son and looked at the crate, asking, "Is that thing locked?"

i.larrañeta@theday.com