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Here is one
of the great training schools where German Shepherds really came into
their own.
This picture is borrowed from one of the pages from the video "Microsoft
dogs" the kids love it.
This picture is from a video of the disaster scene
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THE RIGHT DOGS FOR THE JOB.
Cutting from the NYT by Denise Flaim 18/9/01)
The nuts and bolts of training reliable search-and-rescue canines
The prevailing sentiment following the Twin Towers tragedy was a desire to do something, anything. Which explained the blood-donor lines that stretched for blocks.
Animal lovers, too, responded, fretting about creatures left unattended in apartments below the Canal Street evacuation line, circulating the addresses and phone numbers of the city's animal-rescue locations and amassing donations of doggie boots for the victim-searching dogs that were reportedly cutting their pads on shards of steel and glass. Indeed, as the rescue effort got under way, a spotlight was on those canine-led teams searching for survivors.
Cole Brown, the external affairs chairman for the National Association for Search and Rescue (www.nasar.org) in Chantilly, Va., said the nonprofit organization had been deluged with offers of help.
All were referred to local emergency-management agencies, and many were turned down. Because of the scope and severity of the World Trade Center scene, said Brown, only teams with extensive experience - in many cases, 20 years or better - were being asked to pitch in
. In upstate Parish, Roger Fox, chairman of the New York State Federation of Search & Rescue Teams (www.nys fedsar.org), was fielding similar calls, including one from a California attorney who said,
"I just need someone to tell me to come out. But no one will talk to me."
"Is your dog certified?" Fox asked. "Are you a member of an organized search-and-rescue group?"
Uh, no. And no again. For those would-be rescue volunteers whose expertise did not match their enthusiasm in last week's tragedy, now might be a good time to sit back, understand what search and rescue really involves, and decide if it's a commitment you and your dog truly can make.
First off, Fox points out, there is a big difference between urban and wilderness search-and-rescue training, for which most teams, including his, are trained. Urban, or disaster, rescue typically involves a hazardous environment filled with distractions, from explosions to sirens, and tight, enclosed spaces.
Additionally, some dogs are trained to search for only live victims, while others seek out just cadavers; dogs that could differentiate between the two - and communicate it to their handlers - were crucial for the first stage of rescue work at the Twin Towers.
To draw even more distinctions, some dogs are trackers and trailers, following a particular scent for a particular person, while others are air-scenters, simply looking for any and all human scents.
German shepherds are a popular choice for rescue work, because of their large size and resiliency, both mental and physical. Labrador retrievers are often used as SAR dogs in this country, as are Rottweilers. But at a recent search-and-rescue conference, Fox says, he saw everything from border collies to Newfoundlands, and plenty of random-breds. Regardless of its pedigree, what matters most with an SAR dog is its attitude,
Fox says. "The dog has to have a drive to want to play, to be nosy and investigative, and to love people, because, ultimately, that's what they're looking for." Search-and-rescuers draw a definite distinction between their dogs, which do not do protection work, and police canines, which are trained to track, pursue and hold individuals.
Cooperation between volunteer SAR groups and local law enforcement varies, depending on the municipality, Fox says, adding that in some cases, police don't even know the groups exist. If you're interested in SAR, the first step is finding a nearby team - search the Internet, talk with people who know and have worked with the SAR group before. Fox estimates it takes about a year and a half of training before a dog's SAR potential can be developed and assessed. "There's no guarantee," he says, "that just because you start, you'll finish."
Several groups, including the NASAR, test and certify search-and-rescue dogs. Though tests vary from group to group, Fox offers this yardstick: "Generally, an air-scent dog has to be able to find a single individual in a 40-acre area in less than an hour." In an ideal world, your years of training and practicing will be for naught, because events won't require them. But if another disaster unfolds, Fox recalls the lessons learned by rescue teams at the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.
"Dogs are like people; they get depressed if they keep finding dead people as opposed to live ones," he says. "So they took them out and started doing fake live finds." Hope, it turns out, is not limited by species./cutting ends
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Why not send the dogs a letter or a bone?