A young New Brunswick boy has his cat back after it was stuck on the ledge of a bridge for four days, thanks to the help of a local rock climber.

"I'm really happy to have been able to help," says Rehan Basson.

As an experienced rock climber, Basson is used to being in unusual situations, but earlier this week, he experienced something new.

Basson got a call asking for his help in rescuing a cat that was trapped on a ledge under a bridge.

"We had to set up a repel so the police blocked off the bridge, then we pulled up a truck and we anchored the ropes onto the truck, then we toss them over the side and we repelled down to the cat," says Basson.

Basson was actually the third person to try to save the cat.

The first plan was to lower a live trap baited with food to try and lure the cat inside, but the cat wouldn't go for it.

"It was really hard to get the live trap there, because you had to swing them in," says Nicole Thebeau of Kent County Animal Rescue.

After the attempted cage rescue, the Saint-Louis-de-Kent Fire Department showed up to help. They raised a ladder, but as a firefighter was climbing up, it collapsed and he fell to the rocks under the bridge.

The firefighter was injured and taken to hospital by ambulance.

That accident made it stressful for Thebeau to watch Basson’s attempt.

"My heart was pounding, I didn’t see the fireman fall, I was working that morning, but just to know that someone had already gotten injured, I was extremely worried about Rehan" says Thebeau.

The animal eventually came close enough for Basson to grab it.

"It slowly started approaching me until I could pet it, eventually it came closer and closer, it became comfortable when he came close enough I was able to grab the cat, put it in the bag, and rappel down to the bottom," says Basson.

The rescue was more special because the little boy who owns the cat, Max Martin, lives with an auto-immune deficiency.

"Really for me it was just cool to be able to use a skill set that I learned doing something that I love, to be able to help someone else," says Basson.

The sense was the cat was friendly, but distressed after being on the ledge for four days.

Nicole Thebeau says the little boy is grateful to have his cat back and that the firefighter who fell is also back home recovering from his injuries.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Jonathan MacInnis.