Posted on 07/26/2016 3:20:39 PM PDT by nickcarraway
More than a dozen American Kennel Club registered dogs died in a hot truck last week on their way to a show in St. Joseph County, Indiana.
All but one of the dogs were golden retrievers, the South Bend Tribune reported, and they were being transported to an AKC dog show at the county fairgrounds by Cortney Corral-Morris of Lakesyde Kennels in Wellington, Ohio.
Corral-Morris parked the transport truck, which was equipped with air conditioning in the cargo area where the dogs were kept, outside a local motel Friday afternoon, the report added.
She plugged an extension cord into the side of the hotel's exterior wall to provide power to the truck overnight, a setup that worked without incident the previous two nights. She fed and exercised the dogs, then went into the hotel to nap for about two hours.
The dogs were found dead at about 6:20 p.m. Friday evening, St. Joseph County Police Lt. William Redman told the Associated Press. According to Redman, an electrical circuit breaker cut the power, but police still do not know what triggered the circuit breaker.
Corral-Morris, who owned several of the dogs herself, was “almost hysterically upset about these animals,” St. Joseph County Humane Society executive director Genny Carlson told WSBT.com.
Temperatures in the area reached a daytime high of around 86 degrees, according to weather.com meteorologist Jonathan Erdman.
“According to noheatstroke.org, temperatures inside a closed vehicle on a sunny day typically rise 45 to 50 degrees over the course of several hours,” Erdman said, “which would equate to an interior temperature of at least 130 degrees in over an hour.”
Humane society officials confirmed to WSBT that the prosecutor’s office is not set to file any charges for animal cruelty or neglect in the death of the 14 dogs.
Carlson, who led the humane society’s portion of the investigation, told Cleveland.com that the incident was “a very tragic situation," but that she didn’t “think this was intentional at all."
"Everyone hurts when this happens,"the Waters family w/ dog Popcorn,says of the death of 14 dogs due to heat.#wsbt22
The county’s code of ordinance says no animal should be left inside a vehicle if the conditions inside would warrant a health hazard, WSBT also reported.
Participants in the American Kennel Club Dog Show in St. Joseph County, Indiana, show their dogs just a day after 14 dogs slated to appear in the show died in a hot truck. (Michael Caterina/South Bend Tribune) “If the A/C was working per our ordinance, if the other ordinances were being followed, they could be in a vehicle,” Carlson told the station.
The deaths cast a heavy shadow over the dog show, said Cheryl Crompton, of Mishawaka, Indiana, who served as chairwoman for the Friday portion of events.
"To have something this tragic happen, it affects everybody," Crompton told Cleveland 19 News. "It's been very solemn all day. I've cried, just at the loss of life."
Most of animals’ nine different owners have requested to have their pets returned to them, Carlson told WTSB, but two were taken to Purdue University in West Lafayette for a necropsy on Tuesday.
"I hope we can get across to everybody that, especially in heat like this, we have to take special precautions," said Carlson. "Children and the elderly are at risk, and so are animals. Even if an animal lives outside all of the time, no one is used to this kind of heat.”
This guts me...what a damned tragedy.
Which makes this all the more tragic.
Well that sucks
That’s very sad.
I can hardly bear to read this.
Sorry but someone who shows and owns dogs should know better than to leave dogs in a closed car on a hot day. Any number of circumstances could occur which would cut the power. . . Someone tripping on the cord, power failure . . Taking that chance with any animal is just stupid and irresponsible.
Me too....I love greyhounds.
Excuse my stupdity....they weren’t greyhounds.
I agree. I live in the area and have heard too damned much about this over the last few days. At the least they should have had a special alarm that you can install in these vehicles to make sure that if the AC is not working or if something is going wrong, they can alert the handlers.
Oh man, so sad.
That is a very beautiful poem! I’ve never seen it before, thanks for posting!!
I tend to agree with you. It says it worked overnight, but in this instance, she was only gone two hours? That doesn’t seem very long, but obviously her system was not adequate.
Horrible. Just horrible. What a horrible nightmare. Staybridge and Marriott Residence are good places for dogs and the owner. I am not sure I could talk the hotel into letting 15 in the suite...... : (
We show dogs, and this kind of thing is the very reason we do not send our dogs out with handlers. We take our dogs to the show, we meet our handlers there , and will not show at an outside show when the temperature is high. When the show is done the dogs go home with us, they are our kids. please don’t put all the blame on the Handler she could not have foreseen this any more than anyone else. as owners we need to take some responsibility for our dogs. I think as the owners of show dogs all of us owners of show dogs should probably move to these Club to show in late September October November when the weather is cooler or show indoors during the winter and cease these summer shows when humidity and temperatures stress both the dogs and the handlers. maybe then we would not see this kind of thing
So sweet...makes me think of my dear Jack...our 14 year old Sheltie who passed away at home Feb. 17, 2013. He was so beautiful...we loved him dearly and always will. (Wish I knew how to post a picture...most would enjoy seeing how beautiful he was...on the big side for a Sheltie (about 35 pounds)...sable color and oh so sweet a boy!)
Why not just have Windows that will open and open the Windows?
There are big shows in South Carolina this weekend. People will be on high alert there and at the Virginia cluster after that. The VA shows have 30 & 50 amp hookups, which makes an enormous difference in safety.
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