Isaac is letting sleeping dogs lie. In fact, thanks to advance action from animal-welfare groups, it looks like many pets will survive the storm.
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By Gerald Herbert, AP
Tommy Leonard of Port Sulphur, La., brings his dog Snuggles to a rescue spot.
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After Katrina devastated Louisiana and Mississippi pet populations, killing countless animals and even some owners who steadfastly refused to leave their pets behind, the pet stories from Isaac look much more upbeat.
Emergency animal shelters were set up days before the storm hit. Hundreds of pets were ID-tagged and microchipped at emergency clinics over the weekend. Websites are in place for people to post pictures of lost pets. Shelter animals have been moved to facilities in other states to make room for strays.
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"If there was a silver lining in Katrina, it is that we have become so much more prepared and so much better aware for animal issues," says Dick Green, a disaster-response director for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
"Katrina was a great stimulus for all of us and a catalyst for change."
After Katrina, Congress passed the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act in 2006, requiring that any state receiving money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency have a plan for pet evacuation.
"In Katrina, there was nowhere to go with your pets. There was nowhere to take them," says Krystyna Szczechowski, marketing specialist at the Humane Society of South Mississippi. "We lost a lot of lives because people wouldn't leave without their pets and a lot of pets' lives because people had no choice but to leave them."
Many people now are taking advantage of evacuation shelters that accept pets or animal shelters that are located right next to Red Cross human shelters.
The South Mississippi Humane Society works with the local bus system, which picks up people to go to human shelters.
"We follow them around with our vehicles so we can transport them and their pets safety to the pet-friendly shelter," Szczechowski says.
For those who do lose their pet in a storm, there is a much better chance for a reunion now than ever before because of Internet networking, says Maura Davies, vice president for communication at the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Texas. "Even as Isaac was about to hit, there were already groups on Facebook who were ready to post pictures of the lost pets of Isaac, and Petfinder.com is ready to do it at the drop of a hat," says Davies. "There was nothing like that during Katrina; we learned as we went."
The Humane Society of South Mississippi injected microchips and put ID tags on more than 450 pets in an emergency clinic over the weekend in an effort to make it easier to find a lost pet.
