Robin Kilgore arrived at the gates of the Logan, West Virginia, animal shelter to find a cardboard box lying on the ground as he drove through severe downpours to pick up a puppy from the facility.

She could only hear weeping over the sound of the rain when she stepped out of the car.

“It was raining super hard and the box was soaked,” Selena Marcum, president of The Paws Squad rеscuе, told. Marcum was the first person Kilgore called after finding the box.

When Kilgore opened the box, a mother cat peered up at her — and three newborn kittens were shivering at her side.

Marcum remarked, “She shifted the box and it immediately fell apart. “The mother and her children were drenched.”

The employees at One By One Animal Advocates kindly volunteered to locate the young family a foster home because Kilgore had already planned to drive a dog there later that day. She loaded them for the journey after drying them off.

Vets estimated that the kittens were only 3 or 4 days old — so they wouldn’t have sưrvivеd in those cold, wet conditions for much longer.

“We’re very lucky that Robin happened to find them when she did,” Marcum said. “I truly think they would’ve drowned in that box.”

According to Marcum, it’s very common for people to dump animals in front of the county shelter before the facility opens its doors for the day.

“We’ve driven over to pick up animals before and have seen them stuffed in boxes, or tied to the front gates outside,” she said.

Although it’s unknown how long the mother cat and her young were left outside in the rain, they thankfully suffered no health consequences and are currently residing in a foster home.

Gypsie is the new name for the mother cat, while Cheddar, Velveeta, and Panda are the names of her three kittens.