Pet Disaster Relief Trailer can provide help during times of disaster

Imagine a catastrophic storm requires residents to evacuate their homes immediately, but the beloved family pet or service animal can’t be found. Or the residents want to leave ahead of the storm with a pet, but are not sure what shelters accept animals. What would you do? Leave and protect your personal safety, and leave your pet behind or put yourself in harm’s way to find your animals?

To help solve this problem, AKC Reunite donated a pet disaster relief trailer with supplies to the Sacramento County Department of Animal Care and Regulation. AKC Pet Disaster Relief provides trailers to tax-exempt organizations who provide animal care services during the first 72 hours following a disaster, before FEMA support and services are deployed.  The AKC trailers help to create a safe, temporary home-base for at least 65 pets immediately after a disaster is declared.

“When disaster strikes, many animals that are wandering and lost are not necessarily strays but family pets,” said Dave Dickinson, Director of Sacramento County’s Animal Care and Regulation. “This trailer and its supplies will prepare us for a better disaster response and give us the tools to reunite people and their pets during stressful times, when lives are turned upside down.”

“This trailer and its supplies will prepare us for a better disaster response and give us the tools to reunite people and their pets during stressful times, when lives are turned upside down.”

The purchase of the trailer was made possible by $22,000 in donations and grants from the AKC Humane Fund, Inc., a not-for-profit that promotes responsible pet ownership, and AKC Reunite, the nation’s largest non-profit pet identification and recovery service.

“The AKC Humane Fund works to assist pet owners when their lives have been temporally disrupted,” said Doug Ljungren, President and CEO of the AKC Humane Fund, Inc. “A pet disaster relief trailer will help citizens in Sacramento County find safety for their pets at times when it matters the most.”

The trailers house and deliver essential supplies such as fans, lighting and generators; cleaning supplies; maintenance items; and animal care items including crates and carriers, AKC Reunite microchips and an AKC Reunite universal microchip scanner, as well as bowls, collars and leashes.

The trailer can provide temporary re-location for pets and service animals for people who evacuate their homes during disasters such as floods, hazmat emergencies, or earthquakes. It can be used to create one of two types of animal shelters:

  • Co-location shelter, which houses both humans and their animal companions. The people housed at the shelter are responsible for their animal’s general care.
  • Lost and found pet shelters, in which displaced animals are housed in what becomes a reunion center for people and their animals.

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For more information about AKC Pet Disaster Relief, visitwww.akcreunite.org/relief. For more information about Sacramento County’s Department of Animal Care and Regulation, also known as the Bradshaw Animal Shelter, visit www.acr.saccounty.net.