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Garo and Racker: Hometown
Heroes
Elizabeth Kreitler and her two
canine partners, Racker and Garo, are veterans of search and
rescue. The dogs are her companions certainly, but have a much
more important purpose. Racker and Elizabeth are members of the
elite Virginia Task Force 1, part of the
Federal Emergency Management Agency’s network of emergency
responders certified in urban search and rescue (USAR). Each
of the 28 FEMA task force units deploy with up to 73 people,
four canines, and a comprehensive equipment cache. VA-TF1 is one
of only two units that may deploy for international emergencies,
as well as domestic; and Elizabeth and Racker have recently
traveled to Haiti and Japan at the request of the U.S. Agency
for International Development (USAID) to assist with rescue of
living victims of the natural disasters in those countries.
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Garo, a seven-year-old male,
castrated German Shepherd Dog, is certified by the
American Rescue Dog Association. His special skills
and training enable him to detect human remains (HRD) on
land or in water. Through the organization Search and
Rescue
Dogs of Maryland. Garo and Elizabeth assist official
agencies with wilderness search and recovery services,
primarily within the state of Maryland. Like many highly
skilled volunteers Elizabeth and her dogs train long
hours to develop and maintain their proficiency and
certifications without financial gain, and often at
meaningful personal expense.
Elizabeth’s motives seem
clear: she genuinely wants to help people who need it,
whether that is helping to rescue a trapped victim, or
finding the remains of a loved one so that a grieving
family can attain closure. She trains her dogs to do the
work they were bred to do, and to be the best tools they
can be to help people. Despite all the technological
advances of the 21st century working dogs can do what
sophisticated instruments or gadgets cannot: they can
find unconscious or deceased victims, by identifying
infinitesimally small amounts of human scent in the air
and tracing it to the source.
Garo and Racker use
airscenting to follow diffused or windborne particles
back to the source, usually the missing victim, and then
bark to indicate the find. Area search dogs typically
work off-leash traversing wide areas of terrain, while
the urban search and rescue (disaster search) dogs work
on rubble piles associated with collapsed building
structures.
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Their agility and relatively smaller
size permits them access to places that their handlers may not
safely traverse. Atmospheric, wind, and current conditions
influence their efficiency, and their range. The dogs are
typically expected to work long shifts of 8-10 hours, even under
adverse circumstances of heat or cold, so focus and stamina are
key traits. Water recovery dogs like Garo search for drowning
victims by boat, smelling the surface of the water, and then
divers are dispatched to search the area they indicate.
According to Elizabeth the most
successful dogs are usually those that were bred with the
genetic foundation to work and be great athletes, as may be
found within certain working lines of retrievers or herding
breeds. They must be very driven dogs, for prey or a toy
substitute; they should have solid temperaments and good nerve
strength because these qualities affect how purely the drive can
be expressed. They also must be sociable and possess an
on-and-off switch. Elizabeth favors the German shepherd breed
and currently works two shepherds, but the vast majority of
active FEMA taskforce dogs are Labradors (59%) according to
Disasterdog. org, the unofficial website of task force dog
handler-members. Border collies, German shepherds, golden
retrievers, and Belgian malinois are the other most common
breeds of the 251 dogs tabulated.
http://www.disasterdog.org/pdf/rosters/2011/K9/K9Roster_Oct2011.pdf.
Choosing the right candidate partner
is very individual. Some handlers prefer to begin with an 8- to
12-week old puppy to raise for longer bonding, early training
opportunities, and to avoid buying someone else’s bad habits,
but Elizabeth points out that this approach is risky. One may
invest many hours of training and time in a puppy who could have
significant developmental orthopedic issues or temperament
concerns that are not apparent until the dogs reach adolescence
or adulthood. Racker, who is currently four years old, was
purchased sight unseen from a German kennel as a green dog of 10
months of age, having been identified by a friend as a promising
candidate with lots of drive. “Good dogs are hard to find,” she
says and in “greater demand since 9-11.” Many other interest
groups target the same dogs, such as military and
law-enforcement groups; and civilians such as Elizabeth and
other volunteers are challenged to pay the competitive prices,
which may exceed $5000.
Handlers may begin their own
training in advance of finding the right dog, as they must learn
wilderness and survival tactics, first aid and basic
orienteering and be certified as handlers. Their canine partners
must also be certified by testing. For FEMA certification the
canine candidate must be at least 18 months old. Wear and tear
usually limits their productive careers to 5 to 7 years, so most
dogs are retired near 8 years of age. Racker was a natural and
was certified after about only a year of intensive training, so
he is expected to have a long productive career. Despite Garo’s
established pedigree and the success of his father as a search
and rescue dog, Garo did not find a comfortable niche until he
was moved into in HRD and water recovery.
Elizabeth has been into dogs since
childhood, when she spent lots of time with her family’s pets,
but her focused work with dogs has been a more recent
engagement. Her professional pursuits have been diverse,
beginning with work in advertising on Madison Avenue in New
York, moving on to scuba diving instruction, and include a stint
as a veterinary technician in a surgical specialty practice in
Annapolis. She was affiliated with Search and Rescue Dogs of
Maryland in the mid 90’s when then-president Garrett Dyer
introduced her to the Virginia Task Force and mentored her
dog-handling career. She counts his tutelage as one of the most
important reasons that she and her dogs were able to become
proficient so quickly in the field of search and rescue.
Currently Elizabeth devotes the
majority of her day to training and to maintaining Racker and
Garo as highly specialized working dogs or taking them on
assignment. The dogs need consistent stimulation to maintain
their edge, with simple daily exercises that may last only 30-40
minutes, combining play and search with toys, as well as basic
obedience. Training on rock piles in quarries or on simulated
rubble piles is less frequent, perhaps once or twice a week, but
poorly captures the true challenges of the disaster setting.
Only with solid experience can the dogs display their maximal
potential. After their first year in the field she sees good
dogs improve 100% as they learn and adapt to the rigors of the
work. Trial by fire is likely how the good handlers improve, as
well.
The dogs’ dedicated efforts are
readily apparent to the local residents and to other emergency
workers, and their appearance on site can be very inspiring. And
while disaster work is hazardous space constraints are so tight
on most missions that veterinarians are not routinely included.
Veterinarians usually participate on a task force only if they
are cross-trained as a canine search specialist or in another
essential position. The unique medical needs of these working
dogs are the focus of The
Urban Search and Rescue Veterinary
Group, veterinarians who train and drill with the teams and
educate the handlers and other team members. These vets express
their dedication to ensuring that the search and rescue dogs
return home as healthy as they went out.
Fortunately many injuries are
preventable by careful inspection, frequent bathing, cleaning of
extremities, and eye and nose washes. Preventing dehydration is
of paramount importance and avoiding heat exertion.
http://www.9-11dogs.org/field%20trtmt%20otto%20et%20al.pdf
Minor toxin exposures can be
routinely addressed with daily decontamination. Most soft tissue
injuries, such as lacerations, can be tended to in the field by
the team medic or by the handlers themselves. Elizabeth’s dogs
have been very lucky, she notes, as they are healthy and have
been rarely injured on the job. She did share an amusing
anecdote about how poorly one of her dogs worked during training
shortly after receiving an intranasal kennel cough vaccine—it
seems the local effects of the vaccine temporarily disrupted
that ultra-sensitive nose!
The hours are long and the pay
largely nonexistent for rescue workers, but the work is
gratifying, and there are successful rescues and recoveries.
Elizabeth is ready to travel at a moment’s notice, and she may
be away from her home and family in Annapolis for one to two
weeks at a time, lucky to receive a clean bunk and fresh water
when she gets to her destination. On the plus side, of course,
is that every day is “Take your dog to work day.” She has had
some amazing adventures with her dogs, and she deserves our
admiration and respect. She is quick to share credit with her
dogs, who she thinks are strong workers. We do too! |
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Important
Links from this article
Urban Search and Rescue
Veterinary Group
FEMA Urban Search and Rescue
American Rescue Dog
Association
Rescue Dogs of Maryland
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