The accident

On April 17, Wang received a message online asking for help: a yellow dog near the Xuancheng Railway Station had been hit by a car and was unable to move, eat or drink.

"On April 18, I arrived at the station and was surprised by the scene," said Wang.

On the station square, a row of taxis was parked beside a traffic island covered in green shrubs. Dozens of drivers had gathered, not waiting for passengers, but anxiously discussing the little yellow dog curled up in front of them.

At one point, Fan took out a stack of cash and a handwritten donation list. The list had no names, only a series of license plate numbers and donation amounts varying from 20 yuan ($2.94) to 1,000 yuan ($147.10).

Several days earlier, the dog had been hit by a passing vehicle. After the taxi drivers found it, they took it to a pet hospital and were told it needed immediate surgery, costing more than 10,000 yuan.

"(It had) three fractures in the front and hind limbs. The right hind leg was the most severely injured, with bone dislocation requiring immediate surgery, or it would face amputation or even death," said taxi driver Zhang Xinming.

One of the initiators of the donations, Zhang personally gave 1,000 yuan. His monthly income from operating a taxi is about 3,000 yuan.

In the taxi waiting area at the west square of the railway station, two pieces of paper were eventually posted on the bulletin board, recording total donations of more than 4,000 yuan by 48 taxi drivers and eight generous individuals.

"Despite these donations, it was still not enough for the treatment, so after a simple anti-inflammatory treatment, we took the yellow dog back to the train station and continued to find ways to help," Zhang said.

The dog was in so much pain that it wouldn't eat or drink. The drivers were afraid it would be hit by another car, so they moved it into the shrubbery.