A young boy has been reunited with his favourite toy after a stranger rescued it from the train tracks at West Ham.
Six-year-old Raffi Kier was given cuddly octopus Tenny for his fourth birthday, and since then the pair have been inseparable.
His mum Amy said: “He goes everywhere with him.”
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But Raffi was left in tears after they became separated on January 4, when the octopus fell onto the train tracks at West Ham station.
Amy contacted Transport for London to report the lost toy and consoled Raffi by saying: “It will come back at some point hopefully,” despite her fears that it would not.
Much to her surprise and to Raffi's joy, Tenny was reunited with the family on January 15 after he was saved by a stranger.
Andrew Elliott, 24, had noticed the toy on the tracks the day it was lost but was on his way to work and was forced to postpone the rescue.
The customer services agent from Upminster said: “There was a man on the platform sitting in a little box, and I knocked on the glass very sheepishly and asked if he would be able to help me get the toy.
“I gave him my name and my phone number and he said we’ll have to call a specialist and they’ll call when it is ready to be collected, but he hinted that I should not hold out too much hope.”
Around six hours later, Andrew got a call saying: “I’ve got your octopus – it’s very wet and it’s very dirty, do you want to come and get it?”
The octopus was given a wash, dried and was disinfected before Andrew took to social media to locate the owner.
Amy was sent a post of Tenny from a c2c Facebook group by her brother.
She said: “I could not believe it.
“(Raffi’s) asked if I could put all the pictures of Tenny’s journey all over his bedroom.
“I think it teaches Raffi a really nice lesson about the kindness of other people’s actions as someone has really looked after something he cares about.”
Since Raffi has been told the story about his toy being rescued and cleaned, he has “started getting all his teddies and really looking after them” according to Amy.
Raffi was also given a handwritten note "from Tenny" written by Andrew, saying how much he had missed his owner.
Andrew said: “It is incredibly lucky that I found the owner – it was really surreal.
“I really didn’t expect it to balloon into what it did on social media.
“Even now my phone goes crazy with comments and people liking the post.”
Reporting by PA.
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