(Nov 18, 2005)

With the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina reduced to an occasional reference in the local news, it doesn't mean the work there is done.

Veterinary technician Chris Robinson recently returned from her second trip to New Orleans, where people and animals are still in great need.

"I know it is forefront in my mind because of being there," she said. "But I want others to know that just because it isn't on the news everyday, doesn't mean there isn't much left to be done."

Robinson, who lives in Cambridge and manages Pioneer Pet Clinic in Kitchener, and fellow veterinary technician Annette Pecak drove together to New Orleans in September. They paid for the trip themselves and used holiday time from work.

They started out in a northern suburb of New Orleans and traveled around until they ended up working in Gonzales, La., in the largest temporary animal shelter in the state.

"Thousands of animals went through that facility," Robinson said. "There were probably 500 dogs, 150 cats, 300 horses...reptiles, birds, goats...everything you could imagine. They were all rescued animals. There are 15 temporary shelters down there."

Robinson and Pecak mostly worked there, helping with medical treatments on animals that were sick with infections or injuries. There were lots of gastrointestinal issues from animals scavenging to eat whatever they could find, including garbage. Each night, there were triage centres set up for the animals that had been rescued through the day.

"New Orleans wasn't yet open to anyone but rescuers," Robinson said. "You had to have credentials to be there. We would team up with a veterinarian and do the intake of these animals."

She and Pecak vaccinated animals, dewormed and defleaed them, and then helped get them set up with accommodations until they could be sent to another shelter out of state and put into foster homes.

The goal of animal rescue operations was to look after those left behind, and eventually reunite them with their owners whenever possible. During intake, each animal was photographed and an identifying microchip was given. The address at which the animal was found was also noted. The animal was then registered with Petfinder.com, a website that allows owners to search for their lost pets.

"The whole point was to reunite them if they could," Robinson said.

She and Pecak also traveled into New Orleans to do animal search and rescue work. They were given a map and basically just started looking. Because areas were still flooded, they needed credentials for every National Guard checkpoint to be allowed in.

"We were given crowbars and they basically taught us how to break into houses," Robinson said. "But it wasn't random. There were calls from people who gave their addresses and said they had left pets behind."

Twenty-eight days after the storm, calls came in to check 700 addresses.

"So we went in together and broke into houses," Robinson said. "Most of them weren't there anymore. So we looked for signs that they were around and then we would leave enough food and water for a month. It became fairly obvious within a couple of weeks that there were so many animals running around that the priority was to get the ones who were trapped."

Robinson and Pecak also traveled around, setting up food and water stations for animals every few blocks. They saw many animals, primarily dogs, roaming. If the animals looked healthy, rescuers did not try to catch them. Those animals would make use of the feeding stations and would be rounded up later on, once the trapped pets had been freed.

"We didn't find any trapped animals on our list," Robinson said. "But we found two that weren't on our list. It really was like a ghost town. There was no sound, no electricity. It was like a nuclear bomb went off. It was weird. So silent."

The trapped dogs, one in a house and the other in a backyard, looked pretty healthy, so they were left with food and water to await rescuers who would come later.

Robinson and Pecak brought six dogs back home with them. After listing them on Petfinder.com, the animals were taken to the Kitchener-Waterloo Humane Society and then placed in foster homes.

Among the dogs they brought back was Jazz (temporarily named by Robinson in honour of New Orleans), a female cross that Robinson figured was a little more than a year old. Jazz is currently living with Robinson and her family.

"Jazz was quite sick when we brought her back," she said. "But she's doing great now. Her health is good. And I'm really making major attempts to find her owner. The happiest ending for me would be to have her reunited with her owners."

Upon her return home, Robinson wanted to be back in New Orleans, but couldn't afford another trip. Coincidently, she was contacted by a rescue association that asked her to return for a week on Nov. 3.

"We were doing a lot of search and rescue," she said. "It was a whole different ballgame this time. There were a lot of people back in certain areas and they would give us an idea where some of the animals were."

She continued to set up food and water stations for animals running loose, and worked at Muttshack Animal Rescue Foundation.

While she was doing search and rescue, Robinson responded to a call from a construction worker who found a dog - 73 days after Katrina.

"He was a little Pekinese cross that looked about 15 years old, but he was only about a year and a half," she said. "As I approached him, he would walk three steps and fall over. He was a walking skeleton, so dehydrated and so weak."

She took the dog to an emergency clinic and heard a few days ago that he is doing incredibly well and is now in a foster home.

There was also a German shepherd that had been trapped in a house and was found 72 days after the storm.

"It was also a walking skeleton," she said. "It was brought into the treatment area. It couldn't walk at all."

The dog was given fluids through an IV and looked after. Amazingly enough, it started to recover immediately.

On this recent trip, Robinson said she personally witnessed the definition of the human-animal bond.

She met a man in a poverty-stricken area, who told her he had three dogs and couldn't get anymore food for them. He didn't have a car, so Robinson went for food and headed to his address.

He told her that when Katrina was coming, he didn't want to leave his dogs. So he stayed. Once the water entered his home and was up to his neck, he realized he had to get out. He broke out through a hole in the roof and was rescued. He was not allowed to take his dogs.

He got back to his dogs 13 days later. They were skinny, but they were OK.

"He almost died to stay with his dogs and then he was forced to leave them," Robinson said.

"He is the reason that I'm working so hard to find Jazz's owner."