America Profile
Grandma Wilma’s Band of Superstars
M
Stung by the Oklahoma City bombing, this retired teacher created an elite team of search and rescue dogs that has traveled the world to save lives. BY BILL HOFFMANN
eet the rag-tag band of canine misfi ts who’ve been transformed into decorated service dogs
ready to dash into any disaster to help save lives. The scrappy crew — whose mem-
bers come from shelters, shuttered puppy mills, broken homes, and even the streets of America — are part of a troupe trained by the National Disas- ter Service Dog Foundation. “Dogs are faster than any artifi cial technology at fi nding live people bur- ied in rubble,“ says Wilma Melville, who founded the group after working as a canine handler during the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and seeing how ill-prepared the nation was in responding to catastrophes. “My research indicated a severe
shortage of search dogs in the U.S. If another large-scale disaster hit, live
victims could be left behind. “How would it be if somebody’s
wife survived a building collapse only to perish because searchers didn’t have the assets to fi nd her fast enough? In my mind, that was unacceptable. “So I began a non-profi t
with a goal of creating 168 search dog squads — one for every victim of Oklahoma City.
Melville, a spunky 85-year-old grandmother and retired phys-ed teacher, is the author of “Hero Dogs: How a Pack of Rescues, Rejects and Strays Became America’s Greatest Disaster-Search Partners,” out this month from St. Martin’s Press. It chronicles the
terror attacks, earthquakes, hurricanes and
other calamities that she and her tail- wagging team have responded to over the years. Soon after the Oklahoma tragedy,
Melville and a small army of volun- teers began the daunting task of comb- ing the country for failed service dogs, homeless mutts, and about-to-be-euth- anized loners that nobody wanted — but who had the potential to become rescue superstars. “We needed dogs that could focus on a single scent amid the chaos of a disaster site, dogs that had the stamina of a professional athlete, the fearlessness of a soldier, the cunning intellect of an escape artist and the compassion of a nurse,” Melville says.
“But top-bred dogs match- ing
these characteristics could cost in the thousands
of dollars, and for what I had in mind, they’d have to be free. Or damn close.” Among the extraordinary animals
they recruited: Ana, a spirited Golden Retriever given up numerous times by owners who couldn’t control her; Zorro, a sharp-eyed German Shep- herd able to dart into rubble piles
READY FOR ACTION Wilma Melville, 85, with her beloved German Shepherd Asta — one of hundreds of canines she’s trained to dash into disasters and locate survivors.
JANUARY 2019 | NEWSMAX 31
ALL IMAGES COURTESY OF
SEARCHDOGFOUNDATION.ORG
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