A female lurcher dog has survived falling out of the back of a horsebox which was travelling at more than 70 mph on the M56 near Altrincham two days ago.

The bitch was narrowly missed by several cars before dragging herself onto the grass verge.

A witness who saw the incident pulled over and was horrified to see the driver of the van pulling the horsebox, stopped and came back for the dog with his two children, but abandoned her when she snarled at him and drove off.

The witness then called the RSPCA and the Highways Agency.

When the RSPCA’s animal welfare officer, Katie Glenn, got the call she was fearful of the

state the dog would be in:

“In my head, I’m thinking this dog is going to be close to death but by the time I got there she was still fighting.”

Katie called in a vet who brought two nurses to assist him and gave the lurcher, who is believed to be between two and three years old, painkillers and a sedative so that they could move her back to his surgery.

Miraculously, although she had nasty abrasions and cuts, the only broken bone was her pelvis which was fractured in three places.

The RSPCA’s Altrincham branch agreed to pay the £600 cost of her operation and she is now being cared for by them.

She is mainly white with grey patches and spots and when the vet turned her over he found evidence that she had been wounded before and stitched up using a veterinary anaesthetic spray.

The witness who helped us at the scene did not take the number plate of the van or the horse box but did give us a description – it is a white Mitsubishi 4×4 with a cab and a flatbed at the back and had blue stickers on it and the horse box was blue with a silver top and what looked like French words on it.

The incident took place between junctions 7-8 on the eastbound carriageway.

Enquiries to the Highways Agency to see if they can check CCTV footage from the motorway to get the registration mark of the vehicle have not been answered yet.

The RSPCA are appealing to any other witnesses on the M56 who may have taken note of the registration and anyone who recognises the dog and can tell us who owns it to call this number and say they have information for AWO Glenn in N2: 0300-123-8018