With all the serious discussion about H1N1 Swine Flu, sometimes it’s just nice to see a lighter side to the topic!
Check out this H1N1 Halloween Pumpkin from Chris Streeter on Flickr! http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisstreeter/ / CC BY-ND 2.0
Author: Paul Faust
Just recently, I have taken in a new foster dog that might make it as a search dog. Mack is a 10 month old GSD/black lab mix that was just too much of a handful for his current owner. Due to his constant digging and barking, they moved him to the back yard when he was about 5 months old and he had very little play or structure since then. He’s currently 76lbs and definitely has his own idea on how the world works. The majority of dogs get a new name when they go into a program to help give them a new lease on life, we named him Mack because he was so big and pushy…as in ‘Mack Truck’.
So what did I see in Mack to make me think he might make it as a search dog? First, when he got out of the car, in a strange location, he walked right up to me and said hi. He showed a little bit of leeriness, which is perfectly fine but no barking at me in fear or avoidance. I picked up one of the many frisbees that I have and guess what, he wanted to play with me! This is fantastic! He was not overall dependent on his owner for courage, meaning his desire for his toy was greater than him being afraid of me, or of the location he was in. He also would play tug with me, which is the best thing that could have possibly happened.
Next, we loaded him back up in the car, drove to a different location and got him back out. We then pulled out two tennis balls and started throwing them in tall grass. All he wanted to do was run after them and hunt for them in the tall grass, not giving up until he found one. This is also a great sign!
So based on those couple of tests and his overall temperament we decided that if he didn’t make it as a disaster dog, he would be okay as a wilderness search dog. So I loaded him the truck, with my 3 other dogs, and took him home!
The next day, I took him out to the rubble pile to see how he did. Wouldn’t you know, he surprised me and chased a frisbee up onto all different aspects of the pile! I don’t think he realized he had four feet but that didn’t keep him from running up there to get the toy.
We actually have a scoring system for how the dogs react and a specific directions, but I won’t bore you with those. If you really would like to see them they are located at www.disasterdog.org.
In the last week, we’ve been working on him barking for a toy, which he now will do without a problem. He even will bark at me for the toy, which is laying at my feet! He also has some food guarding issues which we are working through. However, I do think all the components are there and with some work, they will come shining through.
Dunder and Mack are playing well, I’ll be taking them both out to the rubble pile to train and work on skills.
Wags,
Robin
Are states prepared to deal with major catastrophes? This issue is tackled by James Carafano in his Washington Examiner Column. He writes:
Few states have even begun to address their requirements for catastrophic planning. Most lack the expertise and resources to undertake large-scale disaster planning. Most focus available resources on “everyday” disaster response: Vermont must plan for snowstorms, Hawaii for volcanic eruptions and California for earthquakes. They’re far less motivated to think about the wider menu of disasters, from biological plagues to dirty bombs.
Are things any better at the federal level? Carafano continues:
Even the federal effort has ground to a halt. The cats don’t like being herded. To make the job easier, the Department of Homeland Security tried grouping the 15 scenarios into a group of eight “scenario sets,” but other federal agencies still complained there were too many planning requirements.
In response to the disastrous state of disaster planning, the Obama White House has put the whole effort on hold while it “rethinks” the presidential directives requiring the agencies to do anything. That’s not good news.
If your emergency preparedness plan is to wait for your local and federal government to come and rescue you, this report on the state of things should change your thinking. Preparedness is your individual and family responsibility, and you should buy the kits you need and take the right steps to ensure you and your family’s safety.
Categories
Lasting Impact of Power Failures
Losing power when you least expect it and when you’re unprepared can have a lasting effect. Two small towns in Massachusetts celebrated the anniversary of an ice storm that left them without power for an extended period. The Worcester Telegram and Gazette reports:
Residents of Lunenburg and Fitchburg are still talking about what happened to them after losing power for up to two weeks; area artists have created paintings and other objets d’art at the Rollstone Studios; the Fitchburg Senior Center held an Icebreaker Party; and yesterday, protesters picketed Unitil headquarters; and the Lunenburg Firefighters Association held a community event at the fire station, giving away free emergency starter kits.
“I was friendly with my neighbors before, but now we are friends,” Mr. [Jay] Rinaldi added.
He was without power for 11 days and had to cancel classes he taught in Boston. And he not only used his fireplace to keep his house warm, but also cooked pizza over that fire.
If you’re renting an apartment, you may not have the luxury of a woodstove or fireplace in your apartment. What will you do for heat and food? Homeowners also have to think through how they will get enough food, water and heat to stay alive. Do you have the supplies you need for a 2 week power failure?
Source:
http://www.telegram.com/article/20091213/NEWS/912130420/0/NEWS03
Categories
A Sad Reminder about House Fires
House fires can be devastating to families. Even if no deaths occur, you can be emotionally traumatized by the loss of precious items burned in the fire. The following story reported by the Olympian is another sad reminder of the need to be prepared for fires:
Jerry Gilliland’s home on Walnut Loop on Olympia’s west side was destroyed Thursday night, most likely after a candle in the living room fell from a wall sconce, he said.
Gilliland lived at the home with his wife, daughter and son-in-law, as well as two granddaughters, ages 8 and 6. All six family members made it out of the home after a smoke detector alerted them to the blaze a little after 7 p.m., but the family’s beagle, Ivy, died, Gilliland said.
Gilliland was back at his home Friday afternoon, trying to salvage any belongings that hadn’t been destroyed. He said he was able to save precious little, including jewelry and family photos from the home, where he has lived since 1987.
You can learn from this story by doing what you can now to prevent future loss because of a fire. For example, put all valuable documents, jewelry and other items in a fire and water proof safe. Store the safe with your home survival kit so that you can evacuate with them both.
Source:
http://www.theolympian.com/southsound/story/1068278.html
As reported in a recent ABC News Story, Congress is investigating the current shortage in swine flu vaccine availability and they’re not pleased to say the least!
Specifically, members of Congress are upset at Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius who promised back in September:
“We are confident that vaccine is going to be far more widely available. There is enough vaccine and will be to vaccinate every American who wants to be vaccinated and we are pushing it out as quickly as we can.”
That statement is particularly upsetting to pregnant women and young children across the country that waited several hours for a swine flu vaccine, and then being told there was none available for them. To add to the confusion was the complexity added by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention when they created two lists of people who would receive the vaccine first, which included a “high-priority” and “most-at-risk” group).
While starting off slow, the swine flu is now running rampant throughout the United States, as ABC Reports… ‘According to figures released by the CDC last week, since April an estimated 22 million people in the U.S. have become ill from the H1N1 virus, 98,000 people have been hospitalized, and 3,900 people have died, including 540 children.’
Well Google can’t exactly cure the flu (yet!), but it can get you a lot closer to a favorable outcome. They recently launched the very useful Flu Shot Finder application that is integrated with Google Maps.
As its name suggests, the Flu Shot Finder helps you identify local places where you can get a flu shot.
One of the best features is that it shows you what type of flu shot is available at each individual location:
- seasonal flu shot
- H1N1 (swine) flu shot
- both types of flu shots
Another great feature is that they show which locations are “Temporarily Out of Stock”.
However, even if a location looks like it’s not out of stock, it’s best to call ahead of time to determine hours and availability. In fact, it’s also worth calling the locations that are out of stock, since there’s no guarantee the information being provided to Google is real-time and a location may have restocked their supply of flu shots already.
Greetings all,
One of the things I thought I would touch on is what it takes to be a search dog handler in a disaster setting. Usually on tv or in the papers you see these people walking around with nicely trained dogs in a horrible setting and think, ‘wow, that would be cool, going out there with Fluffy to find people.’ There is a lot of training that goes into the dog and the handler to prepare them for that type of a situation.
A disaster search dog handler has to sit through classroom training, yes, it’s not always about working with a dog. You do have to understand things about safety, collapsed structures, rope systems, hazardous materials, marking systems for buildings that are not safe, how to communicate in the command structure as well as all of the information you need on how to train and handle a search dog. This type of training is what professional firefighters also go through to prepare them for their career(the basics anyway). So as a canine handler, you have to understand how to fit in that structure, how to keep yourself and the rest of your team safe, help the person you are looking for AND handle the dog. This takes a lot of time. My team training for this weekend is actually the maintenance of my CPR/First aid certification through the Red Cross, which has NOTHING to do with training my dog but is part of my responsibility for keeping my skills as a first responder current.
So yes, you do have to spend a lot of time on ‘non dog stuff’ in order to be a disaster dog handler. Keep in mind, FEMA has a 40 hour class that all disaster dog search dog handlers MUST go through before you can be deployed. This is not a class that is open to the general public, you have to be part of a FEMA team in order to take the class. You spend 1/2 a day in classroom learning about such things as building markings, how buildings collapse and the safety precautions you have to take as well as dog training things. You then spend the afternoon out training, HARD. In addition to this 40 hour class, the other classes include: your hazardous materials class is usually 16 hours of classroom, the ropes class is also 16 hours, the CPR/First Aid is 8-12 hours, then you also have the incident command classes which run anywhere from 4 to 32 hours of classroom. That’s a lot of time in the classroom and very little spent working your dog!!!!!
So then, you add your dog training time on top of that. You and your dog have to train in obedience, agility, rubble search and having the dog take directions on which way to search. So while you are sitting in class learning all sorts of new things, at some point you have to make time to train with your dog (remember, the cool part about searching with Fluffy). First and foremost, you have to see if Fluffy has the ability to do this work. (which is a whole different post).
Am I trying to talk anyone out of doing this type of volunteer work, NO! It’s great, I love it and my dogs love having a job. But then I’m the person who got up at 4am on Saturday, drove 3 hours, to sit in class for 6 hours, train my dog for 1 hour, train other people’s dogs for 2 hours, drive home for 3 hours (got home at 8pm) and spent my own money to do it.
Just have an appreciation for how much time, sweat and training those cool dog handlers have put in when they make their job look easy.
Wags,
Robin and Dunder (search dog in training)
Greetings to all,
As you think about disasters, being personally prepared is extremely important and I’m glad to see all the posts that are coming into the site. Keep in mind, many of the people you may deal with in disaster situations (including Katrina and tornadoes) are volunteers.
Many people do not realize it, but 95% of the search and rescue dog handlers out there are volunteers. They spend their own time and money training/certifying and even deploying to disasters. Only the federal FEMA teams and some of the state disaster teams have paid positions. However, you still only get paid for deployments, NOT for training.
This weekend, Dunder and I are off to some training and will be posting a few pictures next week of what we are doing. Dunder is a 16 month old yellow lab/golden retriever cross that was found in a shelter. We will be attending ‘drive’ training. (no he isn’t learning how to drive…he’s learning to want his toy more!) Basically, we are going to go play tug and let him bark at people. For us this is fun, for lots of other people they would find that annoying.
We do this type of training because a search dog’s job has to be fun for them, or they won’t do it well. Nintey percent of what I do is spend time trying to make the ‘training’ that Dunder and I do fun. It’s all a game to him with the biggest reward being that game of tug at the end. (I bet your boss wished you worked for something that cheap.)
Wags!
Robin and K9 Dunder (search dog in training)
A dear friend of mine, Matt Kane, was a survivor of Flight 1549. I asked him to give me his thoughts on his experience.
As a survivor of flight 1549 I believe preparation and emotional control were the key to our survival. It starts with the crew, especially Capt Sully. Their ability to make critical/correct decisions throughout the experience was key to the final outcome. The first thing he and the crew did was face their reality. They were not immune to their fear, but they did not allow it to control them. It was all about the question what is next. They were able to control the panic and tap into their emotional benchmark.
Both the crew and the survivors of flight 1549 were prepared for the situation. The crews years of experience allowed them to make critical decisions and execution. The passengers were not overcome by fear and panic, but were prepared by inflating lift vests, opening exit doors and existing in an orderly controlled fashion.
I can make these comments with the upmost confidence based on the fact that I experience this from seat 24 A with water up to my waist before the exit doors were open. We were prepared for the situation, we did not panic and survived.