Dogs Find Publicity, if Not Survivors

For 10 days they listened for the “focused bark,” that robust yelp that meant life somewhere beneath the rubble. But all they heard was silence.

The vast heaps of debris where the World Trade Center once stood had become an enormous playground for the search dogs and a sprawling graveyard for humans. The dogs sniffed in holes and tunnels hoping to find a human scent and win a reward: a rubber hose to chew on.

“We were all hoping for a miracle,” said Debra Tosch, executive director of the Ojai-based National Disaster Search Dog Foundation, which sent 13 dogs and handlers to New York after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. “But given the kind of collapse it was--you had four floors compacted into a pile 1 foot high--the chance of survivors was slim.”

The highly trained dogs, mostly black Labradors and golden retrievers, can detect live humans under deep piles of rubble. When they do, they point their noses at the location and bark loudly, the focused bark handlers hope to hear.

At the World Trade Center there were only dead bodies. To bolster canine morale, handlers played a discrete game of hide-and-seek.

“We would bury someone in the light rubble and let the dogs find them,” said Rick Lee, a handler and foundation member from Sacramento.

But while the dogs may not have found survivors, their fearlessness and tenacity in New York thrust the foundation into the national spotlight.

Dog Gets a Pat From President

Dusty, a black Labrador, helped ring the bell of the New York Stock Exchange the day it reopened. Anna, another foundation canine, rushed President Bush when he visited rescue workers, earning a presidential pat on the head.

It was heady stuff for an operation run out of a small office by two full-time staffers, a handful of volunteers and lots of private donations.

Wilma Melville, a quietly intense 67-year-old, founded the group in 1995 after the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City.

Years before, the retired physical education teacher from Newark, N.J., tried to turn her dog into a wilderness search dog.

“It was very haphazard in those days,” she said. “There were little cells of people who trained together with little expertise.”

Eventually she found a qualified trainer in Gilroy who helped turn her dog, Murphy, into a wilderness search dog that became certified to Federal Emergency Management Agency standards. The pair, now retired, became members of FEMA’s newly created urban search-and-rescue task forces.

They searched for bodies on Mt. Baldy, they were part of an emergency team at the Atlanta Olympics and in 1995 they went to Oklahoma City.

Oklahoma changed everything.

It was, Melville said, an “incredibly evil act.” Unlike earthquakes, which often topple buildings but leave open spaces where people can survive, the bomb lifted a portion of the structure and dropped it, pulverizing nearly everyone inside.

“Throughout the six days there wasn’t a single bark,” Melville said. “The dog looks at the rubble as a vast playground, but handlers are bombarded with emotions. Your emotions must be put in a box. When you get home you can sort things out.”

After returning to Ojai, Melville started a nonprofit group to train search dogs and pair them with handlers from across the state. The teams are activated by the state Office of Emergency Services during times of disaster.

The dogs, often rescued from the pound, are trained in Gilroy for six months, which costs the foundation about $5,000 per animal. Most dogs are between 10 months and 2 years old. They must love rewards, exhibit high energy and be bold. When dogs graduate, a handler, usually a firefighter, is given the animal. Training continues on a weekly basis as long as the animal remains a search dog.

California, with its earthquakes, fires and floods, is far ahead of the rest of the country in numbers of advanced search dogs. Nationwide there are 48 such dogs, 28 are in California and 12 belong to the foundation.

Happy Times for Dogs, but Not Humans

Handlers must train regularly and deploy to disaster areas in a moment’s notice.

“We do wilderness and disaster training twice a week,” said Howard Orr, a dog handler from Camarillo who also went to New York. “We hide people in trees, ravines, culverts and the recycling center under cans. Dogs love it, it’s all hide-and-seek to them.”

While the dogs happily sniffed around the World Trade Center, their handlers found themselves overwhelmed by the carnage.

“Television doesn’t do it justice,” said Tosch, the foundation’s director who went with her golden retriever, Abby. “She was having a good time, her tail was going back and forth. But she seemed to know this was more than normal training.”

Orr said debris was piled eight stories high in some places.

“The cranes looked like Tonka toys out there,” said the Santa Barbara County firefighter. “At night you had floodlights casting shadows, and with the smoke it was like a movie set. Hollywood couldn’t have done better.”

The dogs scampered over narrow beams high above the rubble. They burrowed into holes, pawed over jagged and twisted metal. Their eyes and noses were constantly hosed down for dust and ash. And they performed another vital function--they comforted rescuers.

“Dogs are therapy for some people,” Tosch said. “They reach out to them in times of stress. I had one firefighter break down while hugging Abby.”

Still, the searchers wanted to find survivors.

In the end, their dogs were able to sniff out dead bodies even though they weren’t trained as cadaver dogs.

“Ultimately, we would have liked to find someone alive,” Orr said. “You train and train for that, but you get some satisfaction with finding a body that can be identified. It kind of sobers you because you realize there are faces to each of those bodies.”

Anyone wishing to donate to the foundation can call (888) 646-1242.