In the snow-covered Colorado mountains, man's best friend can quickly become man's best chance at survival. Meet Colorado's avalanche dogs and their trainers:
In the snow-covered Colorado mountains, man's best friend can quickly become man's best chance at survival.Humans have put dogs to work for hundreds of years, but it was only a few decades ago that they were brought in as a unique and crucial tool in avalanche recovery and rescue.
It was 1987 in Breckenridge. Outside the ski area boundary on Peak 7, an avalanche broke, catching eight people. Four did not have avalanche transceivers and were buried and killed. Search and rescue took three days and hundreds of rescuers.That kickstarted the demand for stronger and faster response teams, which led to the introduction of critical care transport group Flight for Life in Summit County in the 1990s and then the idea of avalanche dogs, said Doug Lesch, president of C-RAD.
When they're on the job, avalanche dogs are non-scent discriminatory, meaning they aren't seeking a specific person. After all, rescuers want to find any kind of human scent coming from under the snow, no matter who it is. The dog must have a"recognizable and repeatable trained final response" like digging or a bark once it recognizes that smell, Lesch said.
"We want them to have that commitment to that person , even in the unfortunate circumstance if that person is deceased and can’t play tug with them," he said."And the concept there for us is we run hundreds and hundreds of drills with positive reinforcement with the...
"We ask people to come with a relationship and involvement and membership with another rescue organization so that this investment and the training they're getting can be used somewhere," Lesch said."So somebody recreationally who wants to just train their dog to be an avalanche rescue dog — while good-intentioned, if they don't have an outlet to use those skills, then that training kind of stops at that point.
About 30 dog teams and instructors — between 50 and 60 on the biggest day — participated. They represented 18 ski patrols and five search and rescue teams, Lesch said. " a huge honor for us, as a young dog team, to host that dog school and be so successful doing so," he said."After the last couple years we've all had, it sure was a great time to have all those dog teams here, see all those faces we've missed for a while.""We feel honored to be an asset to the community," LaRocca said."And we really, really take what we do seriously. We train to the highest level. We train weekly.
"I'll grab two or three patrollers, we'll go out somewhere, we'll dig a hole, we'll actually put somebody in the snow, cover up that hole, disguise the surface of the snow so she can't tell where this person is," he said."Take all the clues away, let that scent percolate through the snow. And we'll train her on finding somebody underneath the snow. Hopefully, we get a chance to do that at least once or twice a week — keep our skills as sharp as they can be.
"They're doing trainings and attending courses on their weekends," Lesch said."For us, our model has been to subsidize as much of that as we can."
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Here are Thursday's coldest wind chill readings across ColoradoAlready-frigid temperatures across Colorado plummeted even further on Thursday thanks to gusty winds that brought real-feel temperatures deep into the negatives. Here are the coldest wind chill readings: COwx
Read more »
Colorado nursing homes continue to see COVID outbreaks, but deaths have become more rareWhile clusters of COVID-19 cases are once again widespread in Colorado nursing homes and assisted living facilities, deaths from the virus have become significantly rarer, according to state data.
Read more »
7 best things to do in Colorado this Christmas weekend: Dec. 23-25, 2022Every weekend, Denver7 compiles a list of some fun events you might enjoy. Here are our picks for the 7 best things to do in the Denver metro area and beyond this weekend.
Read more »
Live blog: Arctic blast will grip Colorado through Friday before temperatures warm up this weekendThe Denver District Attorney's Office is now closed through Friday so that the Wellington E. Webb municipal office building can be turned into a warming center.
Read more »
Deion to Colorado QB Commit: ‘Get on Twitter And Start Recruiting’“It basically got to the point where Coach Prime told me, ‘Get on Twitter and start recruiting your future teammates.’ That’s what I’ve been trying to do.”
Read more »
Colorado flu hospitalizations rise again, while COVID and RSV see declineThe flu hospitalization rate rose again after falling the previous week. Hospitalizations with COVID and RSV dropped, though it’s not clear whether they will rise again as people travel and g…
Read more »