Pound Puppies Trained For Important Work

From the pound to pounding a beat … The highway patrol is training dogs rescued from San Francisco Bay area pounds to assist with homeland security. The dogs are being trained to identify explosives. After graduation, they are assigned to one of seven CHP commercial vehicle inspection stations.

CHP Lieutenant Mike Ferrell is assigned to the Cordelia Inspection Facility. He says “Mauric” and handler Paul Mcintyre are already on the lookout for explosives. The state budget crisis means there´s no money for the CHP to buy bomb-sniffing dogs – so they´ve been turning to condemned hounds. As Ferrell put it – “We´re saving taxpayer dollars as well as abandoned dogs.”

Since the terror attacks of September 11th – the highway patrol is running inspection stations 24 hours a day.

The dogs and their handlers – all officers – graduated last week from a nine-week academy course. Another training class begins in January.