Hunter’s day in Haiti: One rescue dog finds three children in rubble
by Dogasaur on January 18, 2010
Jan 18, 2010
A firefighter and his search dog located three girls trapped alive since Tuesday in the rubble of Haiti’s devastating earthquake. Bill Monahan and his Border Collie, Hunter, were searching a neighborhood near the Presidential Palace, concentrating on a large bowl-shaped area of rubble which was all that remained of a 4-story building.
After criss-crossing the area, Hunter pin-pointed the survivors’ scent under 4 feet of broken concrete and did a sustained “bark alert” to let Bill know where the victims were. Bill spoke with the survivors, then passed them bottles of water tied to the end of a stick. As they reached for the water one of the girls said, “Thank you.” Highly trained rescue crews from California Task Force 2 pulled the girls from the wreckage and provided first aid.
Bill and Hunter were trained by the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation — the only non-profit in the nation that recruits rescued dogs, partners them with firefighters, and trains them to find survivors buried in the aftermath of disasters. The teams and their ongoing training are provided at no cost to Fire Departments throughout the country.
A Dogasaur “Dogs In The News” re-post
Great job Hunter and Bill. I am thankful that you were there and were able to have a successful rescue. The term “man’’s best friend” definitely has deep meaning when you have trained dogs like Hunter. It would be nice if people would train dogs instead of mistreat them. The world would be a better place. Thank you for your service.
Ann
Comment by ondway — January 18, 2010 @ 6:43 pm