Military working dog team inspects potential 22,000-gallon bomb

by Staff Sgt. Thomas J. Doscher
386th Air Expeditionary Public Affairs

4/10/2009 – CAMP BUCCA, Iraq (AFNS) — Military working dog handlers and their canine partners are used throughout Southwest Asia to detect explosives that are meant to injure servicemembers and innocent civilians. 

For one dog handler, Staff Sgt. Joseph Null, and his dog, Lucca, this task took an interesting turn.

ROCK SOLID WARRIOR
CAMP BUCCA, Iraq — Staff Sgt. Joseph Null, 42nd Military Police Brigade military working dog handler, and his dog, Lucca, successfully investigated a 22,000-gallon fuel truck that had gone off the road in Iraq to ensure it contained no explosives. Sergeant Null is deployed from the 52nd Security Forces Squadron at Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. (Courtesy photo)

“There was a fuel truck that had gone off road and got stuck in the sand,” said the sergeant, who is part of the 42nd Military Police Brigade. “It had been abandoned overnight, and I was tasked to go out with the Army to sweep the area leading up to the vehicle and basically clear the area for improvised explosive devices that had been attached to the vehicle.”

This is an important, though dangerous step, he said.

“Anytime you’re going to have people go into an unknown area, you want to clear it as best as you possibly can,” Sergeant Null said. “If you can have an Explosive Ordnance Disposal team clear it or a bomb-sniffing dog go out there and clear the area, then you’re taking one more threat away from the Soldier who has to go out there and do a job.”

But IEDs weren’t the only threat posed by the abandoned truck. It was carrying 22,000 gallons of gas, potentially turning the truck into a massive fuel bomb.

“That makes a pretty big bomb if there’s some C4 strapped to it,” he said.

For 45 agonizing minutes, Sergeant Null and Lucca searched the area, the handler waiting for the working dog to give him some sign that all wasn’t well with the tanker truck.

“It makes you a little nervous clearing a real area, because you know it’s the real deal,” he said. “But that’s your job. This is what I signed up to do. Somebody’s got to do it, right? If my dog had sat, I would have praised her and gotten back to the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle as quick as possible to report what had happened.”

At this point, it was Lucca’s show. The German Shepherd would either sit, indicating the presence of a bomb, or she wouldn’t.

“You don’t look at the dog as a dog,” Sergeant Null said. “You train together all the time. We’ve been together since June and I couldn’t count the number of hours we’ve spent together. It’s like having a best friend. You think on that same wavelength. My dog goes and does her job, and you know what to look for while she does her job. If you can’t trust the dog, you shouldn’t be out there anyway.”

But Lucca didn’t sit. The truck was clear.

“Everything was good to go,” Sergeant Null said.

Eight hours later, the truck was finally pulled free of the sand, and the convoy made its way back to base. Sergeant Null said that although his primary mission is inside the wire, he’s more than willing to go out again if called upon.

“It’s my job,” he said. “It’s the best job in the Air Force. You get to play with a dog and get paid pretty well for it. You can’t beat that.”

Col. Alan Metzler, 586th Air Expeditionary Group commander, said Joint Expeditionary Tasking Airmen like Sergeant Null are providing critical services in the joint environment and excelling at it.

“Our combat Airmen are doing an outstanding job in support of the mission at Camp Bucca, and Sergeant Null proves it,” Colonel Metzler said. “Often, they have to adapt to situations and perform unique missions we don’t normally ask them to do in the Air Force. Airmen like him demonstrate the Air Force’s commitment to our mission in Iraq

Read this story here: K9 team inspects truck

German police dogs to sniff our rare species

Canines assigned to Frankfurt airport to fight illegal trade in animals 

Associated press
FRANKFURT, Germany – Getting any living thing but yourself past border police at Frankfurt Airport just got tougher.

Amy, a German shepherd, and Uno, a Labrador retriever, have joined the team at one of Europe’s busiest airports — the first two dogs in Germany trained to sniff out live animals, plants or derivatives or remains of them.

The three-year-olds’ debut is a joint effort between police and the World Wildlife Fund to help stop the illegal but lucrative trade in rare species — which the organization estimates is a $293 billion annual business.

“Dogs simply have the better nose,” Volker Homes, the head of species conservation with the WWF’s German branch, said Tuesday. They can detect things that emit only a faint odor “and are therefore ideal for the fast checking of luggage, mail and even full containers.”

Sniffing out an iguana
Police trainers showed off Amy’s talents — letting her out of her cage to run around a row of 15 suitcases, in one of which they had hidden a live iguana borrowed from Frankfurt Zoo.

After sniffing all the luggage carefully, the dog leapt on a gray suitcase in the middle of the row and started barking enthusiastically, tail wagging. Amy stood by as attendants freed the iguana from inside the case.

“After working with border police dogs for 30 years, I’m always surprised at what they can smell,” said Dieter Keller, the main dog trainer for the regional border police.

Keller said that in a test last week, Amy’s partner Uno found about 4.5 pounds of caviar in a suitcase arriving from Eastern Europe. Non-licensed harvest of sturgeon caviar has been restricted since 1998.

Amy and Uno — who join 30 other specialist dogs at the airport trained to sniff out everything from explosives to tobacco and cash — have been through a 10-week, $30,500 training program.

They have been taught to focus on 16 specific smells including feathers, leathers, reptiles, caviar, coral, ivory and bone. Keller wasn’t immediately able to say how much luggage an animal-sniffing dog could cover, but said a drug dog can get through about 2,000 bags in an eight-hour shift.

Illegal trade threatens species’ survival
Police will be trying out the dogs for several months before deciding whether to bring in more four-legged detectives.

“I have a mixed heart about it,” Keller said. “On the one hand I hope the dogs are very successful and make a lot of finds. On the other hand I hope they send a signal to all the people that are thinking of smuggling, discouraging them from coming through Frankfurt Airport.”

WWF’s Homes said he hopes the dogs will help prevent incidents of, for example, tourists bringing home an orchid or a crocodile bag from their vacation.

“Smuggling is a serious danger for the survival of threatened species,” he said.

Even without the specialist dogs, border police at the airport intercepted protected species — or products derived from them — in 561 cases last year.

They confiscated 6,000 live animals; more than 100,000 living plants; and another 5,350 animals that either died on their journey or were already dead and preserved.

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