My friend and colleague Liz Palika lives in the area that was threatened by the fires in San Diego earlier this fall, and was involved in rescuing and sheltering many pets and animals including dogs, horses, small critters, and a number of reptiles and amphibians.
I interviewed her for a story on how differently pets are handled during disasters in post-Katrina America. It was a wonderful interview, and I'm really happy at how the story turned out -- even though it awoke some painful memories:
Marie Knoblock loved her dogs, a Lab named Herman and a chow chow named Jimmi. She became a friend of mine through an online dog forum and when I went to work for a pet community Web site in 2000, she happily gave me photos of her dogs to use. Jimmi's smiling face greets the visitors to the DogHobbyist.com Chow Chow Forum to this day.
But Jimmi smiles only in photos now, because he, along with Marie and Herman, drowned when Hurricane Katrina drove flood waters into their home in Bay St. Louis, Miss. Marie was riding out the storm with her daughter, Kim, and Kim's two dogs, as well as an elderly houseguest and her poodle. When a disaster team showed up to evacuate the three women, they told them they had to leave their dogs behind.
All three made the decision to stay with their dogs, but when water came pouring down their street like a river, they were trapped in the house, the floodwater steadily rising. Kim left the dogs with Marie and swam underwater to the attic stairs, and was able to break out a ventilation panel and escape to the roof. Although she managed to get their houseguest and her poodle out alive, Marie, 63, as well as Jimmi, Herman, and Kim's two dogs, didn't make it past the second floor, and drowned.
Marie's story is not unique. During and after Katrina, I read dozens of stories on pet e-mail lists and forums about people who died, or nearly did, because they refused to leave their pets behind when ordered to evacuate without them. The AARP reported that many of the confirmed Katrina deaths were among senior citizens who would not abandon their pets, although exact numbers are not known.
Nightly newscasts were full of images of pets swimming forlornly after the boats that took their owners away from them. A post-Katrina poll found that 61 percent of pet owners would refuse to evacuate in the face of a disaster if it meant leaving their animals behind. For those people, "animal disaster preparedness" meant nothing more than being prepared to choose between abandoning their pets and death.
Today, it's much less likely that pet owners will have to make that terrible choice. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, disaster response agencies realized that, if human lives were to be saved, the bond between humans and their animals couldn't be ignored. Agencies such as the Red Cross worked with government departments like Homeland Security and private animal groups to develop disaster sheltering and rescue procedures that take companion animal ownership into consideration.
The recent San Diego fires put these new procedures to the test, and for the most part, proved hugely successful. Southern California evacuation facilities had accommodations for animals or arrangements with shelters to care for people's pets and livestock. In addition, businesses, including the Veterinary Clinics of America and a number of hotels, opened their doors to the pets of evacuees. So did many individuals and small business owners.
Pet author and dog trainer Liz Palika was one of those who opened not just the doors of her business but her home to animals in need. Horses and dogs were cared for at her dog training facility, located safely outside the fire area, while many small and unusual pets that local shelters were ill-equipped to handle were boarded by Palika, an experienced keeper of reptiles, amphibians and small pets.
Palika, who is the author of more than 45 books on animal care, agreed that things have changed since the days of Hurricane Katrina. "I know one of the visions I had after Katrina was the little boy with his little fluffy dog that was ripped from his arms," she told me. "And the dog that was chained on the bridge in the sun with no food, no water, and nobody there. That one just tore me up, too, as bad as the little boy losing his dog."
The full article is here -- it also includes an interview with Dr. Jeff Werber, Lassie's veterinarian, on the importance of identification for pets in case of disaster.
Wow, what a riveting headline. But give me a break, it's almost 1 AM and I just got back from walking the dogs. Don't ask.
I miss Jon Stewart so much. The writer's strike, which I fully support, is hurting 
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