Fund-Raising Picnic to Aid Search Dogs

When disaster strikes, sometimes the good guys come in nonhuman form.

On Saturday, residents will be able to check out canine rescuers--and rescuers-in-training--at a fund-raising picnic for the local chapter of the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation.

The foundation, headquartered in Ojai, will present demonstrations by certified disaster search dogs Murphy Black and Bella, who participated in searches after the Oklahoma City bombing two years ago, along with canine apprentices Kelly and Raven. There are 25 certified rescue dogs nationwide, 14 of them in California.

Kelly and Raven, who are sisters, are wrapping up a two-year training course, with final exams expected later this year.

Kelly is being trained by Capt. Gary Smith of the Ventura County Fire Department, while Raven is in training with Point Mugu Firefighter Derek Harper.

Murphy Black is owned by Wilma Melville of Ojai, who founded the organization. Bella is owned by Deresa Teller of Simi Valley, a firefighter in Canoga Park.

Kelly, a black Labrador, takes classes in teeter-totter, ladder climb, crouch and crawl, hand-signal obedience, voice command and--most important--freezing and barking when, and only when, she sniffs out a human scent in a collapsed building.

Her final exam will consist of showing the California Office of Emergency Services and Federal Emergency Management Agency that she not only can do all of the above, but also find six human victims buried or hidden in a huge pile of rubble, and alert her handler of their whereabouts.

It doesn’t matter to Kelly if the disaster is caused by earthquake, mudslide, avalanche or bomb: Her mission is to save people.

Smith hopes to have Kelly certified this year through the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation.

“I train Kelly differently than wilderness search dogs,” Smith said Wednesday at the Fire Department headquarters in Camarillo. “Wilderness search dogs find victims, then come back and get you. A disaster search dog finds a victim and stays at the point of strongest scent, barking, until you get there.

“These dogs can search a 12,000-square-foot building quickly and tell you where to use a search cam,” Smith said. “When you’re digging through, say, concrete, you have to be accurate.”

At night, Kelly goes home to Ojai with Smith, where she leads a normal dog’s life. “But we spend time every day working on something, like down-stay or crouch-crawl,” Smith said. “She’s taught to work around noisy people, sirens and loud power tools so she won’t be distracted in an emergency situation. The two years of training is all for Kelly to stand in a rubble pile, barking.”

Kelly’s teeter-tottering is to accustom her to walking on an unstable surface; the ladder training simulates climbing in a treacherous situation. “Her training begins with people hiding in a tube, with a toy on the other side of the tube. It becomes a game with a reward,” Smith said.

Admission to the fund-raiser, which will run from 3 to 6 p.m., is $10 per person or $25 for a family of four.

For information about the fund-raiser on Old Creek Road between Ojai and Ventura, call 648-9844, Ext. 226.