For the Kaua‘i Search and Rescue K-9 Team, the huge financial burden of funding its entire operation with volunteers is repaid immediately when a missing person is found. The team’s 20 members believe the good of searching for someone must
For the Kaua‘i Search and Rescue K-9 Team, the huge financial burden of funding its entire operation with volunteers is repaid immediately when a missing person is found.
The team’s 20 members believe the good of searching for someone must come before personal gain, said Chad Pacheco, a Kilauea resident serving his 12th year on the team.
The Kaua‘i Search and Rescue K-9 Team, which began in the 1990s as the four-member Hawai‘i Search Dog Association, has fluctuated in size since its inception. Kaua‘i was the first island in the state to have a dog team, but having a dog is not a requirement, Pacheco said.
“We welcome everybody,” Pacheco said. “We get called in for the dog’s noses, but we need members without dogs to help ensure the group’s safety.”
The team practices for five hours each Sunday at different locations around the island. They train their dogs and members in visual tracking, compass work, first aid, topographical map reading and other tactics that prepare them for the complexities of a real search, said Debra Gochros, a Kilauea woman who has been with the team for more than five years.
“It’s not all about having a dog,” she said. “I was on the team for a year and a half before I got my dog. We need members to look for other clues, take compass readings and make sure we are taking breaks.”
Training a dog takes about two years and there are many certifications for search dogs. Finding cadavers, disaster relief and wilderness searching are just some of the areas you can certify a dog, according to Pacheco.
It is also important for members to train their dog daily, as they have to know what their dog is trying to tell them in a search situation.
“Dogs give off clues every single second,” Pacheco said. “Whether it’s the shake of a tail or the way they are acting, you have to be able to read them.”
Members of the team come from all different walks of life, each citing different reasons for joining the volunteer organization.
Gochros said not having kids makes it easy to get out at any hour to join a search, while Pacheco, whose grandfather had Alzheimer’s and went missing a few times, wanted to relieve the anxiety from families with missing loved ones.
“It takes a lot, but you need to work as a team,” she said.
Although the group sticks mainly to Kaua‘i, it will deploy when asked to help on other islands. After the Ka Loko dam breach in 2006, dogs with O‘ahu’s Hawai‘i Urban Search and Rescue, which are more disciplined because of the dangers they could face while working in urban catastrophes, were brought over to help in the search for missing persons.
The search lasted 10 days and presented dangerous situations for the search dogs.
“One thing that members need to accept is the fact that their dog may not come back,” Pacheco said. “And that’s hard for a lot of people.”
Because of the group’s volunteer status; the Kaua‘i Police Department and Kaua‘i Fire Department must be the ones to bring the team on for a search.
“KPD and KFD need to get a lot of credit,” Gochros said. “They make it happen.”
Because of the sensitivity of the subject, the group chooses not to detail specifics about their individual searches, but they have been influential in both successful and unsuccessful efforts.
“We spend a lot of our own money and time on supplies and training,” Pacheco said. “But when you find someone, there’s nothing that you can do that could compare to that.”
For more information, visit kauaisar.org.
