Dog Knocking Over Lit Birthday Cake Has Internet Howling: 'The Silence'

A video of a birthday cake presentation being ruined by an overexcited dog has gone viral on TikTok.

The clip, posted by user @chelsey3022 and watched 13.3 million times, shows a woman in a kitchen picking up a large cake lit with candles and sparklers and carrying it carefully into the living room, where revellers are waiting to celebrate.

As she walks towards a table, a voice can be heard singing"Happy Birthday"—but the woman is being followed by an excited dog trying to reach for the cake. What sounds like a smoke alarm can be heard in the background.

Just as the woman is about to set the cake down, the dog leaps, pushing the creamy confection out of the woman's hand and sending it splattering face-down onto the table. The entire room goes silent as the guests contemplate the ruined cake, while a sparkler continues to fizz on the marble tabletop.

The post was shared with a caption that read "#cakefail" along with crying laughter emojis.

TikTokers were in stitches at the scene, but the American Veterinary Medical Association warns that "candles are attractive to pets," so dogs and other animals should never be left alone in an area where there are lit candles "as it could result in a fire."

A dog eating a candle is also risky. In an article for the website of animal hospital chain VCA, veterinarian Dr. Catherine Barnette wrote: "While candles are often scented with oils, the largest concern with [their] ingestion is a gastrointestinal foreign body and potential obstruction. In addition to an upset stomach, surgical removal of the candle may be necessary if large pieces are ingested."

It's not just the lit candles that would have excited the dog, but the party guests too. A March 2016 study in the journal Animals found that excitable behavior could be "prompted by many daily scenarios," but was most commonly reported "with greater frequency and more severity" when the owner or others came to the dog's home or played with the dog.

"Surprisingly, food preparation by the owner did not prompt excitable behaviors," according to the researchers, with less than a third of owners reporting their dogs were jumping "some of the time or more frequently."

This could be because owners have trained their dogs to sit and wait for food or prepared the food in a different room without the pet seeing it, the study said.

Several TikTokers who commented on the video suggested the dog needed some coaching on party etiquette.

Steven wrote, "This is why you train your dog," alongside a string of laughing emojis.

That-Comment-Guy posted: "Saw that happening a mile off and not one person in the whole room thought to get the dog."

Others were tickled by the room's reaction to the mishap. In a comment that got 22,500 likes, user ganyusmilk wrote: "It's just silence then this one dude is like 'HAPPY BIR-'."

L I A M commented: "Even with the alarm, the silence was deafening." Jazmin <3 noted "the way it got silenttt."

Chloe Glancy summed it up with the comment: "So much chaos."

Newsweek has not independently verified the @chelsey3022 video. The original poster has been contacted for comment.