I saw this news clip this morning and wondered if anyone had any thoughts on it.

http://my.netscape.com/corewidgets/news/story.psp?cat=50900&id=200303170812000248547

Never mind the dog, the handler should have smelt that amount of explosives.

Not suprising.

Pisses me off that it took this long to find out.

What it shows is that there is a need for a mandatory, documented certification process. Having had to deal with "low bids" for everthing from cars to bullets, it has always amazed me that police departments buy dogs soley on the word of the vendor.

DFrost

I can list a host of problems in regards to the use of bomb dogs commercially.
Long hours where the dogs check huge numbers of vehicles, sweeps where the scope is soooo large that the probability of detection is very low. Continued application of the dogs under such circumstances compounding the problems. Personel with no vested interest in success.
Outrageous claims about the profficiency of dogs under such circumstances.
Venders who exagerate what dogs and and should do to get the contracts where those venders who are truthful and forthright would not be given the contract since the selection process allows for exagerated claims.

David C Frost

I totaly agree with you David that hapens here in Aus as well. But you did forget that after they make a bed purchase due to the fact that they dont want to pay a desent price in the firs place. Then they truy to cover it up buy convincing the general public that the police and army dogs are the best.

Alan,

I'm not trying to say that Military and police dogs are better. I've seen some very good dogs come from vendors. I will say though that, generally, Military and police are held to a higher standard. As a staff trainer for a state police, the people I am responsible to, the dog handler, has immediate access to me. It's hard to fool the handler working a dog about whether his/her dog is worth the dog food it's fed. The standards are written, not subjective. Measurement of those standards is a process that does not always involve the staff trainers. Our dog handlers, assigned to various regions of the state, train with local police, customs, Airport police, military and sheriff departments even local search and rescue organizations, on a continuous basis. The certification comes from us, as well as the monthly review of the madatory in service training they recieve.My concerns have always been, as Mr Sheldahl pointed out, some of the outrageous claims of profiecency that are made. Dogs, regardless of the spcecialty for which they are trained that are absolutely perfect. Never miss. Never make a mistake. I've been in the business long enough to know, that just doesn't happen. If you don't know what your dog CAN NOT do, then you will never know what your dog can do.

DFrost

I was wondering if you had a dog searching for bombs all day long how effective would that be anyway.My question is like how long can a dog actively search, wouldnt you need to give the dog a break and switch dogs and also wouldnt you have to plant finds priodically before switching dogs so the dog is always successful and to keep his drive going.I just cant imagine that 1 dog would search all day and never find anything and keep doing it.

David,

How long a dog can work should already be documented during inservice training sessions. It will vary dog to dog, with weather conditions, and the physical exertion required during a search. All these are questions that should be answered, for each individual dog during training. For example: Will the dog work 30 minutes and still find a target. There is only one way to find out. There is a difference in finding three targets in 30 minutes, and working 30 minutes before finding a target. Again, training many times, takes on a routine and we often fail to fully develop the dogs potential by always demanding more. Remember, you will never know what your dog can do until you find out what he can not do.

DFrost