Army personnel with a sniffer dog during a search-and-rescue operation at a landslides-hit area in Wayanad.
Three Labrador dogs of the Indian Army — Jaki, Dixie, and Sara — are working tirelessly to help locate survivors trapped under the debris in the landslides-ravaged areas of Wayanad.
These highly trained canines are working alongside their human counterparts, braving challenging conditions such as mud, slush and rain to sniff out lives.
The dogs are using their keen sense of smell to help find survivors.
The canines were brought from the Dog Training Faculty (DTF) of RVC Centre and College in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh. The faculty, designated as a centre of excellence in dog training, trains dogs in nine specialties, including search and rescue.
The canines brought to Wayanad are Specialist Search and Rescue (SAR) dogs, trained to identify and indicate human scent under rubble, according to Defence sources.
They undergo 12 weeks of basic training, followed by 24 weeks of trade training, to prepare them for this critical responsibility.
These dogs can detect human body scent even under 10-12 ft of rubble. When they get human scent under rubble, they indicate the presence of humans to their handlers, who then dig and recover live or dead bodies.
These dogs have been previously deployed with great success, sources added.
