The Border Collie first came into their lives, they didn't plan to call her Vicious. But according to owner Matt Prime, he saw a sign that read Free Puppies and decided to take one home for his wife. He had some friends staying with him at the time who had a lab mix dog. When he got home with the little puppy, the lab tried to sniff her and she chased the dog across the room, cornered it, and wouldn't let it move. He thought, "that was vicious," and the name stuck. Little did they know that a few years later that little "vicious" dog would save their lives.

It was a warm August evening in Trail, British Columbia and Angie Prime had the house open so that the dogs could go in and out. She had just hung up from talking to her husband and decided that she would let the dogs out for final time before she closed up the house for the evening. As she stretched, she saw something out of the corner of her eye. She turned and was face to face with a cougar. "It was definitely surreal," she said. "We looked at each other and had a moment. It was holy (cow), there's a cougar in my house."

Moments later, the cougar pounced. "I just tried to block myself and raise my leg up and screamed like crazy," she said. That's when Vicious leaped into action. The Border Collie chased the cougar out of the house and up and embankment. Neighbors heard her screams and came outside, but were unable to track down the cougar that evening.

Angie was very fortunate in that she only suffered a single scratch on her leg. Vicious received no wounds from the cougar at all. She was completely fine.

The authorities were amazed that a cougar would enter anyone's home saying that there was a billion to one chance that that would ever happen. "The predator itself was probably attracted to her residence due to the puppy dogs that they had at the residence and it had been hanging around for quite a while," explains Conservation Officer Blair Thin. "And in Angie's situation, it was an older cat that was significantly emaciated." Being so hungry probably led the cougar into the residence.

The Conservation Officer, Angie, and Matt all believe that Vicious was very lucky that the cat didn't turn on her because she could have easily been mauled or killed by the cat.

Because of her quick actions in saving her owner, Vicious has been inducted into the Purina Animal Hall of Fame which recognizes animals for their actions in saving human lives. "For Purina to have this amazing program for us to be able to showcase our pets when they do something amazing like this pretty fantastic," says Angie. "It's an amazing award to have."

"I give her anything she wants now," says Matt. "She gets everything she wants. She's a hero. She did exactly what she was suppose to. She saved Angie's life and I still have a wife and I still have a dog. She's just amazing.