They weren't suppose to make it to Christmas. But as our Christian Farrell tells us, nearly 100 dogs are now lucky to be alive.

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MIDDLETOWN, N.Y. -- An Arkansas animal shelter shuts its doors. Thadius is one of 97 dogs without a home.

"These dogs in our area would just be put to sleep. And there's no sense in that," said Justin Key of the Southwind Animal Hospital in Russellville, Arkansas.

Enter Pets Alive. The Middletown animal shelter arranges to bring the dogs north. A 30 hour tractor trailer trip ended Tuesday when the dogs arrived at their new home.

"Anytime we do a mass rescue like this there's a lot of consideration that goes into it - do we have the volunteers? Do we have the staff? Do we have the funds?," said Kerry Clair of Pets Alive.

The dogs surprisingly showed up in good condition.

"This isn't what we're used to. We're used to taking in harder to place dogs, tougher situations, dogs that need a lot of medical care. But these dogs are ready to go," said Clair.

And because of that, Kerry Clair believes Sissy, Thadius and the rest of the "Arkansas 97" will be placed in new homes within a month.

The Pets Alive adoption process takes less than 24 hours to complete. So, there still is time to find one of these dogs a new home for the holidays.

"If you'd like to surprise your children for Christmas, you can come down as an adult, pick the dog out that you want," said Clair.

And then Pets Alive will actually deliver it for you.

"We've been made honorary elves by Santa this year, and we'll be delivering Christmas morning all the dogs to lucky boys and girls that parents have approved adoptions for," said Clair.