Türkiye's Disaster and Emergency Management (AFAD) formed a commission at the Provincial Disaster and Coordination Center of Sakarya's Sapanca district, where dogs and their trainers will be able to participate in search and rescue activities. The aim is to develop the most trained teams to get support in case of possible disasters.
Dogs can maneuver and move through smaller, more constrained spaces than humans can, assisting their handlers in narrowing the scope of their search.
These dogs and their handlers are adept at working at night and can be deployed while other resources are being marshaled or are regrouping. Trained search and rescue dogs with suitably equipped and experienced handlers can be a valuable supplement to other search resources.
Hüseyin Kaşkaş, head of Sakarya branch of AFAD said dogs are our biggest helpers in search and rescue operations. Acting in line with the instructions of their trainer in the challenging test, the dogs try to find live targets stuck under the wreckage with the least mistakes using their sensitive noses.
They do the searching, and our teams extract. We can definitely make use of them in all disasters. Sensitive-nosed K9 dogs participating in search and rescue efforts in case of possible disasters in Türkiye's district of Sakarya will be examined and the successful ones among those will be awarded certificates.
"The dog, who couldn’t pass this exam, will not be placed in rescue teams of disaster management."
Kaşkaş said this year, the Sakarya Governorate was given the duty of overseeing the inspection and all operational procedures for search dogs. Describing how Governor Çetin Oktay Kaldırım directs the formation of a commission made up of professionals. A similar training exam was conducted last year; 80 search dogs took part, and 41 qualified to take the proficient exam. Only 11 of them, however, were successful on the proficiency test. This year's proficiency training test was conducted from May 25 to June 6, and 69 of our search dogs passed it. Kaşkaş said that search dogs were brought to the training from fire departments in several cities, including AFAD, gendarmerie, police, Balıkesir, Ankara, Istanbul, İzmir, and Aydın, as well as from nongovernmental groups.
Meyli Karagülle, a volunteer with AFAD from Düzce took the exam with her dog named "Reina." She has been working in search and rescue activities for 12 years. "God forbid disasters, but in such a situation, of course, we will try to take support from our dogs. How joyful it would be if we could reach for life," she said.
İbrahim Yılmaz, who is in charge of the İzmir Fire Department, said that he trains dogs to search and rescue and they participated in the exam in Sakarya with three dogs. He added search and rescue is not an individual job but requires a group of people. However, a trained rescue dog can do the job of 15-20 people in a shorter and better way. And for that, expert training is required. Naturally, dogs have the strongest sense of smelling and with the help of their nose, we can save many lives in disasters.
