Mourning Process
The search here is in stark contrast to the many people we found alive in the rubble of the Turkish city of Izmit in 1999. There many people survived in the hollow spaces under concrete slabs that stood against walls. The building construction here in Bam is the cause of the large number of deaths. The walls consisted largely of stones interspersed with clay, and the ceilings were made of straw and clay. With the collapse of the small houses, people were crushed or suffocated under a mass of stones, grit, and dust.
After a short pause we continue searching, and we work until late in the evening. Still we find no survivors, and, as we later hear, our colleagues also have no successes to report. We know, however, that locating the countless dead is still much appreciated. We get a round of thanks from salvage teams for showing them where to dig, and from the families for giving them back their dead relatives, so that the grieving process can begin.
When we drive the next day along the historic citadel of the city, we see that almost nothing is left. Two thousand years this citadel stood, but now the impressive walls have collapsed.
In the city there is chaos; vehicles filled with people and their meager belongings try to leave, blocking the roads for helpers who want enter the city.
During the following days we systematically search the rubble, always with the same result. Our dogs find only dead people and it seems no one under the rubble is still alive. The alerts of the dogs follow each other in rapid succession, and the endurance of our dogs is great to see.
Figure 11.46 In our short breaks, we see how tired the dogs are after long hours of searching.
Mass Graves
People thank us with tears in their eyes and with a hand on their heart. Their folded hands and sad eyes speak volumes. That evening a reporter shows us photos he took at a place where a cemetery was arranged. We see images of mass graves where thousands are laid side by side. An Islamic clergyman walks along the bodies wrapped in white sheets and offers a prayer to all.
Neither he nor our dogs could do anything more for Bam. A city that was slated to be placed on the World Heritage list of cultural-historical monuments no longer exists.
Old and New
At the airport in Bam, our interpreter Mehdi, with tears in his eyes, says goodbye to us and thanks us profusely for our help. He also hugs our dogs—he has seen their value for the detection of people under the rubble.
Figure 11.47 Unfortunately, there was nothing more we and our dogs could do for the people of Bam.
Other groups fly back with us, and so it happens that in the cabin of the Boeing 757–200, with seats for 220 passengers, 56 dogs and 115 people fill the plane. This time Speedy lies stretched beside me on two seats. She is tired and soon falls into a deep sleep. We reach our home in time for the New Year. We hope the New Year will see less suffering.
12
Avalanche Search
Dogs can be trained specifically to search for people in snow, but avalanche search training is also the key to the education of search and rescue dogs in rubble search, as they will thereby learn to find people buried under the ground. The dog has to learn to respond whether in an avalanche or a collapsed building situation.
The simplest alert for the dog to learn is to scratch in the snow. The training method used for collapsed building searches is 100 per cent suited to use in avalanche dog training. The ball in a sock is again used as the prey. In a snow-covered landscape, it is best to use a multicolored sock.