Give… so that others may live!
As was evident after the tragedy of 9/11 and other major man-made and natural disasters, it is critical that we maintain the resource of highly-trained disaster search dog teams in our community and our nation.
Whether dog handler or support personnel, all members of NDSD feel a strong commitment to the mission and freely volunteer our time as we consistently strive to increase our level of expertise.
On average, our dog handlers train over 400 unpaid hours per year, in addition to our regular day jobs! We are what the search and rescue community calls unpaid professionals: our members are highly-trained, certified and ready to go out of the door to respond to a disaster in a short moments notice.
How can you help? You can:
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- Make a donation
- Provide a training site
- Volunteer to hide for our dogs at training
- Become a member
- Make a donation
Donate via Paypal
Join the search!
Membership
Interested applicants should contact NDSD to begin the application process. Please send an email to ndsearchdogs@gmail.com noting your interest in applying. In your email, please mention whether you would like to join as a canine handler or as a support person. In general we encourage applicants without prior K9 SAR experience to join without a dog first. There are many skills to learn for the candidate member before being able to train and handle a dog. NDSD has many experienced handlers and trainers that will be happy to assist a candidate or full member with finding a suitable dog.
Application
Our membership coordinator will reply to interested parties as soon as possible and will send an application form and information package explaining all details about our path to full membership.
All our members need to pass a background check with Pierce County Sheriff’s department and apply for an emergency worker card with the Department of Emergency Management. Our membership coordinator will assists with this after receiving the application.