Within the next couple of years, it’s likely the Whakatipu will boast more operational wilderness LandSAR teams than ever before. The handler of Queenstown’s first operational dog in a decade, Paul Donovan, talks to TRACEY ROXBURGH about the invaluable asset the search and rescue teams provide
About 18 months ago, the Whakatipu got its first operational wilderness LandSAR dog, Stag, in a decade.
Within the next two years, it’s likely there’ll be two other wilderness search teams, along with operational avalanche team Brad Saville and Bomber.
Additionally, there’s another new wilderness team based in Wānaka, Dave Krehic and Lochy, joining the Upper Clutha’s seven avalanche search teams, based at Cardrona and Treble Cone.
The dog squad being in such good heart here, is ‘‘unheard of’’, according to Stag’s new handler, Paul Donovan.
While Stag, a three-year-old Labrador-Springer, was trained by Wakatipu LandSAR volunteer Bridget Martin, with whom he first qualified as operational mid-last year, Donovan helped with his training, and then, after six months’ hard work, qualified with Stag himself in October.
Martin’s now working with her next recruit, Bandit, while Queenstown’s Deo Encarnacion is training up Rua to sit their police assessments.
‘‘That’s a massive resource for the community because in the past, before Stag came along, we were looking at Dunedin to get dogs here,’’ Donovan says.
And when time is of the essence, having resources locally to help the 70-odd Wakatipu LandSAR volunteers find people when it’s gone wrong is invaluable.
There are, in all, seven operational wilderness tracking dog teams in the South Island — Donovan says they’re not just conscious of where they’re based, but areas around them they can get to faster than any other.
Their wider patch stretches from Te Anau to Twizel, though they’ve been called in to help with a search in Haast, while Stag’s already been involved in a successful multi-day search in the Hawkdun Range, near Alexandra, with Donovan.
Stag got involved 24 hours after a woman was reported missing, and managed to pick up the scent after four or five hours, tracking her along a ridge.
That helped the LandSAR vollies narrow their focus, finding her on her third day missing.
‘‘You wonder sometimes, it’s a bit like a child, could you be any more proud or in love?
‘‘To have something like that, when you see all the training pay off, is massive.
‘‘I’m just really happy some of that payback’s happened so quickly for us.’’
Originally from Wellington, Donovan moved to Queenstown three or four years ago, after spending 20 years overseas, and got involved with
LandSAR almost immediately.
He enjoyed volunteering so much he started looking for ways to increase his involvement.
‘‘That’s where I got introduced to Bridget and helped train Stag, so it was just a natural transition, for her to transition Stag to me, because she loves the training process, and I love the operational side.’’
Donovan stresses, though, the search dogs are just a part of an incredible team in the Basin, available 24/7, 365, ‘‘in the worst weather you can imagine’’, to help bring people home.
‘‘Having been overseas for 20 years and to come back to NZ, I just love the community aspect of it.
‘‘The volunteer aspect within NZ — the fire service, St John, LandSAR — there are so many people giving up their time, for nothing, and I just think that’s an amazing reflection on NZ.’’
Donovan says callouts have fallen over the years, in part, here, due to closed borders, but other driving factors include better cellphone coverage in remote areas, more awareness around carrying personal locator beacons, and a huge amount of work marking tracks, based
on previous experience, to lessen the risk of people getting lost.
‘‘Overall, that’s lending itself to reduced numbers, but at the end of the day you want to have a great resource there, because the situation will come that people get lost.’’
He says the dog teams are also indebted to NZ Sotheby’s International Realty for its support with the dogs, in particular.
The Queenstown-based real estate company’s come on board to help cover some of the costs, like handlers’ dog insurance premiums — which have been covered by Search Dogs NZ, but as of next year won’t be — and GPS units on the dogs’ collars, so handlers know where
they are during searches.
‘‘We put in 1000 hours a year ourselves, unpaid, but then we’re paying for things that people would be quite shocked [by].
‘‘We have three main dog camps a year, in Arthurs Pass or Hanmer Springs, when you think about the driving and the kilometres involved in getting to those … let alone all the standard dog harnesses, leashes, and millions of bloody dog toys we go through that they rip apart … I’ve literally got about 50 ducks in different states in my garage.
‘‘With the support of companies like that, we can do what we’re doing, and have confidence to grow,’’ Donovan says.
