A DOG died after it was inadvertently left inside a pet dryer box for at least an hour by its groomers, China Press reported.

On July 21, an employee of the pet shop in Zhangzhou, China’s Fujian province, had placed the Border Collie inside the high-heat box to be dried after a bath.

The staff member then left the shop.

The owner was shocked to receive a call from the shop later that day claiming that Sixty-Six was suffering from heatstroke.

By the time she arrived, the six-year-old dog was already dead.

Upon pressing, the pet shop admitted that the canine was placed in a dryer box.

Local police confirmed that the owner had lodged a police report.

Many Internet users criticised the pet shop.

“How would you feel if you were placed inside a box to be dried under high heat?” one netizen wrote.

(The above articles are compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.)