On the night of July 14th to 15th, the catastrophe struck across entire areas of western Germany. The floods claimed 141 lives – and 17 people are still missing.
The search for the missing is supported by dog rescue teams. Not only German, but also Swiss helpers scour the areas. The Redog helpers go out with trained sniffer dogs when people are missing. Your work is extremely difficult – and stressful.
Even specialists reach their limits
A redog team returned to Switzerland on Monday evening – they were in Ahrtal in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. For three days specially trained search dogs searched the banks of the river Ahr together with their owners. On its homepage, the organization describes the still precarious conditions in the destroyed areas: In some cases, the rubble is so interwoven and intertwined that even the specialists are unable to get through.
The floods washed away and flooded houses, streets, bridges and the entire infrastructure. “Due to the particularly unstable layer of rubble with large cavities as well as areas heavily compacted with mud and a drop edge of around three meters high against the water, the operation was very difficult,” says Redog team manager Brigitte Ochensberger. One can still not rule out that there are still people in lower elevations.
“Great gratitude noticeable”
“The authorities want to make absolutely sure that there are no people in these mountains of waste before they start to remove the mountains with the heavy machines,” explains Ochensberger. This is also the moment when the search dogs are used. After disasters such as floods or landslides, the survivors are first rescued and then survivors are searched for in the rubble. After that, the corpse search dogs are finally called up.
During the operation on the Ahr, the redog team did not come across any corpses. Nevertheless, one noticed how the people in the destroyed area appreciated the work of the animals and their owners, explains Ochensberger. “There is great solidarity, gratitude and willingness to help, both from the affected population and from those who help.” (What)