Go, Riley, go! New county fire rescue dog is in training to save lives
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Just watch him jump; his paws are like springs!
Riley is a hyper dog.
The San Francisco Bay family that owned him didn't know what to do with the yellow Labrador retriever. He was out of control. And frankly, Sundowners Kennels in Gilroy wasn't sure he would successfully complete obedience school.
"The trainers recognized it would take a lot of training to make him a tolerable pet," said Eric Gray, a firefighter and paramedic at Santa Barbara County Fire Department Station 32 in Santa Ynez.
But the Sundowners Kennels employees saw that with all his energy, Riley could be a hero.
He could become a rescue dog.
Today, "Riley's doing awesome," Mr. Gray said. Since the 2-year-old Lab finished his initial 10 months of training at Sundowners Kennels, he is continuing to learn, this time with Mr. Gray as his handler. The two are inseparable.
The public can see them during "Meet Riley," a welcome celebration for the dog at noon Sunday at Elings Park in Santa Barbara. It's sponsored by the Santa Barbara Firefighters Alliance.
Mr. Gray, 36, got Riley on Oct. 15 after the Ojai-based National Disaster Search Dog Foundation gave him to the fire department. Since then, the dog has lived with Mr. Gray, a Monrovia native, and his wife, Donna, at their home in Camarillo. The Lab rides with him inside a kennel in a 2009 Toyota Tacoma pickup truck donated by the alliance.
And as Mr. Gray works each day at the fire station, Riley is right there. They live and work together.
"To say I'm the center of his world is an understatement," said Mr. Gray, who has worked at the station for four years and before that at Station 51 in Lompoc and Gold Coast Ambulance in Oxnard. "I feed him and clean him, and I'm the guy who provides him his toys. We have a very close working relationship" — to the point that Riley doesn't pay a lot of attention to other people. And that, Mr. Gray said, is a good thing. He needs the dog to focus on his job.
Riley is the second rescue dog for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department. Duke, a chocolate Labrador, retired in 2008.
The new Lab is the first rescue dog with whom Mr. Gray has worked. He and Riley spent Wednesday at Universal Studios Hollywood. There, they and dogs and handlers from fire departments for the city and county of Los Angeles and Long Beach got training in search-and-rescue techniques in the back lot, including the "Desperate Housewives" neighborhood. Mr. Gray explained Universal is used because of its variety of environments, which also include a Western town and actual wreckage of a 747 from the movie "War of the Worlds."
Mr. Gray said Riley is showing he's good at everything from agility to climbing to direction control to finding people. Mr. Gray and Riley also train regularly in Santa Barbara and other areas with dogs and handlers from throughout Southern California.
"These dogs have been trained to find a human scent for someone they can't see. They'll disregard people standing in front of them," Mr. Gray said.
He added that Riley's sense of smell is probably a thousand times stronger than that of a human. "If someone is hiding, he'll find them. If they're buried, he'll find them. If they're in a house and are trapped, he'll find them."
When he finds the missing person, Riley is trained to stay there and bark until Mr. Gray arrives. As his reward after his handler gets there during training, the "victim" gives him a bumper — a hard, plastic cylinder with a short rope attached to it — and they play tug-of-war. (In a real search-and-rescue mission, it would be Mr. Gray with the toy.)
"We get work out of them (the dogs), but for them, it's looking for a toy," Mr. Gray said.
He said edible treats aren't used to train the dogs because handlers don't want them being distracted by any food in the buildings they search. In fact, Riley has never been fed human food so he won't be distracted by the smells from someone's refrigerator, Mr. Gray said. The scent that interests Riley is that of the person he can't see.
Dogs have an innate ability to distinguish a human scent, and the rescue canines are taught they won't get to play with their toy unless they seek that smell, said Kate Davern, the trainer who worked with Riley at Sundowners Kennels. To stress the point, Ms. Davern will do things such as placing a chicken in a covered cage, and a dog smelling that will learn it won't lead him to a toy.
After eight months to a year of training with Riley, Mr. Gray said he and Riley will take two tests and be certified by the Federal Emergency Management Agency for search and rescue for local, national and international missions.
Riley and Mr. Gray are part of a Los Angeles County Fire Department regional task force. If Los Angeles County or two counties without fire department search dogs — Ventura and San Luis Obispo — need help, Riley and Mr. Gray will hit the road. They'll also be available to help the city fire department in Santa Barbara.
They could go around the world together. The Los Angeles County task force is one of only two in the U.S. that respond to international calls for help, Mr. Gray said.
Riley is being trained to search for missing people within an urban area, but he will learn to find people, such as a lost child, in large areas such as a wilderness, Mr. Gray said.
He added that Riley is trained to find living people, not bodies. Other dogs are trained for that scent by being taught to search for dead tissue from cadavers. He said Riley was trained to know he gets his toy when he picks up the scent of a person he can't see.
Riley, Mr. Gray stressed, can find people much faster than humans because of his sense of smell, agility and flexibility. The dog also can go through holes in rubble and is being trained to climb ladders.
"Dogs can climb into areas people can't get into," Mr. Gray said. "Dogs can cover a whole lot more area." Riley, who weighs 67 pounds, can go into places that can't sustain more weight. And while it would be a tragedy to lose Riley, Mr. Gray said it's better to send the dog than a human to search dangerous sites such as a building about to collapse.
Riley takes pride in finding missing people during training, Mr. Gray said. "When you see him walk away with his toy, it's almost like he's being boastful."
Good boy, Riley.
