‘Live’: Kelly Ripa Details 911 Drama After Accidentally Locking Dog in Car

“We’re gonna walk the street festival. We’re gonna have the time of our lives,” Ripa shared, noting that her and Mark Consuelos‘ dog, Lena, was a “big hit” at the event. “She made friends. She was like, ‘I’m a California girl now!’ She was prancing down the street. Typically, she’s very afraid of large groups of people and other dogs, but Thursday night, no,” Ripa quipped. “She was like, ‘This is who I am now. I am Palm Springs Lena. I have dog friends. I’m not afraid of people. I love it here.’”

After buying the dates, Ripa returned to her car parked near a casino and placed Lena and her bag in the passenger seat. Upon walking to the driver’s side, Ripa realized that the car doors were locked. “Now, I’m like, ‘Oh, my god! What do I do?’” she recalled.

In a panic, Ripa flagged down “a man in a van” for help. “He looks just as afraid of me as I am of the van. And I say, ‘I’m sorry. That is my car — I lied, it’s my husband’s car — That is my car. I locked the keys and my human dog and my phone inside the car.’ I said ‘my human dog,’ because they need to understand this is more than a dog, this is a person,” she told viewers. “And he says, ‘We’ll call AAA.’ And I go, ‘I would, but my phone is also locked in the car. And, if I’m being honest, I don’t know what AAA is.’ And he goes, ‘What’s your policy number?’ I go, ‘I don’t know what that means. I’m sure it’s all locked in the car.’”

She called 911 from inside the man’s van, as his phone was connected to the vehicle’s Bluetooth. “I’m like, ‘Hi. I’m in the parking garage at the casino, and I have locked my human dog and my phone and my keys and my wallet and everything in the car. Can you send someone to break into the car for me?’” she said. “And they said, ‘Ma’am, we don’t break into cars.’”

Though 911 couldn’t help with her situation, they referred her to a towing company. The man with the van had to leave, so he asked casino security to watch Ripa as she waited for the tow truck.

“This tow truck guy comes. He doesn’t say one word to me. He doesn’t ask any questions, like, ‘Is this your car?’ He just gets right to it,” she noted. “He comes. He breaks into this car in three seconds. I’m not even kidding.”

The car situation lasted only about 20 minutes, but Ripa said it felt like “three years” had passed. “I sit down in the car, I fasten my seatbelt, and Lena’s head pops up,” Ripa stated. “And she was like, ‘You have no idea!’ She looked at me like this, like, ‘There were strangers trying to break into this car. I stayed hidden. Girl…’”

Calling the event “so scary,” Ripa joked, “All I could think of was, ‘Forget the dog. Mark is going to kill me. Mark is going to kill me. I was like, ‘He knows. The dog is psychologically communicating with him, telepathically.’”

Consuelos, for his part, said he was glad Ripa had turned on the car’s air conditioning, as it could have turned into a “dangerous” situation.

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