11/22/18 11:37
Rescue dog unit of the German Johanniter-Unfall-Hilfe e.V. as guest at Labotect
Rescue dog unit of the German Johanniter-Unfall-Hilfe e.V. as guest at Labotect
On November 17 and 18, 2018, eight rescue dog teams from all over Germany met the challenge of the demanding requirements of the theoretical and practical exam for the so-called "mantrailing".
Labotect provided their premises and outdoor area as base camp for the hosting Rescue Dog Squad Southern Lower Saxony of the Johanniter-Unfall-Hilfe e.V. under the direction of Dr. Bettina König. Apart from usage of the main building for breaks, administrative activities and the performance of the theoretical exams, the outdoor facilities could be used as kennel as well as for the catering unit for meal preparation.
Mantrailing is a special form of people search where dogs can track down a missing person by their individual smell. The dogs are able to trace the path of a missing person through odor particles and can thus increase the efficiency in finding them.
For this test, the dogs were given a 24 hour old and 2.5 km long trail of a "missing person” in and around Göttingen to create a realistic exam situation. This exam is only passed by the best man-dog team who work together perfectly since the dogs may not be influenced by external factors like other dogs or pedestrians.
Congratulations to all successful teams!
The rescue dog squad of Johanniter-Unfall-Hilfe e.V. works 365 days a year on a voluntary basis and relies on donations. In case of emergency, they are requested by the police to support the search for the missing person. Apart from mantrailers, they also train dogs for area and rubble search. Area search dogs can search up to 30,000 m2 of cleared areas and forests independently. Rubble search dogs are specifically trained to locate buried persons. The training to become a rescue dog takes around two years.
