Latest news with #BlackLabrador
Otago Daily Times
3 days ago
- General
- Otago Daily Times
Red passes the stick to next generation
A Search and Rescue dog with almost a decade of in-the-field experience has ended his career with one final win. About a week ago, 10-year-old Red, a kelpie, retired after almost nine years of service as a LandSAR search dog. Just a couple of weeks beforehand, he went on his last search, which was a success when he located a missing person in the Dunedin Botanic Garden. Now, he gets to kick up his paws and relax. His owner, LandSAR dog handler Barry Dougherty, said retiring Red had been a "hard decision". "This is his ninth year being a search dog. He's getting older and slowing down — it was a little bit emotional to be honest, making that decision. "I'm retiring Red fit and healthy, so he's got the next five years to lie in the sun, chase cats and do the things he likes." Mr Dougherty said Red was "one of the better dogs" he ever had in relation to search work. While Red now gets to relax all day long, the torch has been passed to Mr Dougherty's junior dogs. Black Labrador Jeffrey was now his only dog sent out to searches, but Mr Dougherty was training up vizsla-cross Bindi to join the team. He had already got a start on training Jeffrey's eventual replacement, Jeffrey's son, Labrador-pointer Macca. "None of this would have been possible without other people's help ... my family have given up a lot for Red to be a search dog; my employer and colleagues at BGIS have allowed me to be ready and available at short notice and at their expense, and LandSAR Dogs have given me guidance, opportunities and knowledge." For years, Mr Dougherty had been taking Red and Jeffrey to work with him, so if a call came in they could leave straight away. It was "strange" not to have Red in the car with him. "I take Jeffrey and I'll take Bindi because she's the next dog. It just gives me the opportunity to go and train her," he said. Red and Jeffrey have been partners for the past five years "working as a team". "Red has done most things dogs don't do ... jet boating on the Clutha River at 2am in the morning or dropped off in the Waitaki River by a jet boat to search the wee islands, getting winched out of helicopters — he likes biscuiting, gotta fight him off." Jeffrey was Dunedin's only operational dog. However, alongside Mr Dougherty other teams in the area were being trained. After more than 25 years spent volunteering with LandSAR, and all the other names it had been called over that timeframe, Mr Dougherty anticipated this would be his last cohort of LandSAR dogs. "In 10 years I'm going to be 65. Surely it'll be time. It is getting harder now. Surely it's going to be really hard by then, so I'll leave it for the younger guys."
CBS News
25-02-2025
- CBS News
Students mourn after suspected fentanyl overdoses claim lives of Santa Rosa teens
Drug overdoses took a deadly toll in Santa Rosa over the weekend. Police are investigating the deaths of four young people, and the hospitalization of two more, to see if they are connected to a man arrested for selling narcotics, possibly laced with fentanyl. On Monday, a makeshift memorial was growing in front of Santa Rosa High School. A 16-year-old student named Gia died from a drug overdose on Saturday. Her friend, Sydney, said it's been heartbreaking. "I really read into it, and I had to go home. I crashed out, honestly, at work. I was crying," she said. "I just can't...I just don't understand why people who are one of the brightest, bubbly people have to be taken away." The same thing was happening at Montgomery High, where an 18-year-old named Logan also passed away. Police said both students were found Saturday night at a residence on Brookwood Drive, victims of a suspected fentanyl overdose, although officers said they may have thought they were ingesting cocaine. Earlier in the day, two other teenagers were hospitalized for suspected overdose. "The fentanyl's in everything," said Sydney. "It's even in weed. It's not just in cocaine, it's also in weed, it's in anything, honestly. And it's so scary." Police arrested a 21-year-old man named Ramon Nunez on Sunday, facing charges of second-degree homicide and furnishing narcotics to a minor. They found distinctive packaging on him, plastic baggies with black peace signs, possibly linking him to the two overdose deaths. Meanwhile, at Montgomery High, Principal April Santos said Logan was a good student with a great core group of friends. "It's devastating," said Santos. "I mean, there are no words to express the trauma that goes along with a loss like this, let alone for the family. My heart goes out to them because I can't imagine this loss of a child. But it's also the students here on campus. That's a lifelong friend, a peer they planned to walk across the stage with and do all those high school rituals and routines. So, it's hard. It's really, really hard." The district was offering extra grief counseling at both schools and a Black Labrador therapy dog named Gemma was on hand to help ease the trauma. The dog's handler, Terry Swehla, said Gemma can sense the students who are suffering in silence. "She will go to the person that doesn't want to talk, that is having a really hard time, and she's, like, 'I'm going to sit with you.' It's very powerful," Swhela told CBS News Bay Area. Back at Santa Rosa High, Sydney said she hopes it's a wake up call that her fellow students will take seriously. "Now, it's like you have to be cautious about everything, even smoking weed. You literally have to be cautious," she said. "You can' cannot trust any of these people who are selling. He needs to be kept locked up. He is a murderer." As of Monday, police had not officially released the names of the four students who suffered overdoses. Two other young people died in Santa Rosa over the weekend, one possibly from drugs, the other may be from natural causes. Police said they don't appear to be related to the other overdoses, but all four deaths are being investigated. In the meantime, they are encouraging parents to have open conversations with their children about the extreme risk of fentanyl-contaminated drugs.
