Customs Patrol Dog attack

First On 9: Customs Patrol Dog Attacks Child At Dulles Airport | WUSA9.com | Washington, DC |

Anyone read that? Any thoughts on the whole issue or what went wrong?

That is tragic. Prayers go out for the girl and her family.

Thoughts on what went wrong? I don't know. I can speculate, based on what I know of malinois and what I know of 4 year olds and what I know of airports and what I know of k-9 habdlers, but without having more information, I really don't know that anything went wrong beyond a tragic accident.

Although I can say that what went wrong in the video is that the news lady said the dog was a Belgian Malinois "much like this one"...while they showed a German Shepherd on camera.

My guess as to what went wrong? The dog had no business being in a busy airport and went off on a child who was reportedly showing high levels of fear towards the dog.

My question though, if the dog "wouldn't let go", how did the mother get multiple bites on her hands?

SOOOO many details missing. I wonder how the dog got to the girl in the first place.... I mean, it's not that difficult to hold a leash, especially in a crowd. They didn't really confirm that this dog was in training, either, did anyone else notice that?

I do training with service dogs at the airport sometimes, and one time there was a K9 there with his handler (a GSD, I think). I didn't know he was there, we (my dog and I) went up the elevator and he was right there when the doors opened.... and immediately started barking madly at us. My dog was nervous but thankfully never vocalized and we were able to simply walk away. What struck me about the whole situation, though, was that the handler seemed to do nothing to get his dog quiet... he basically just stood there and let it happen. He could have at least tried to get his dog turned around or around a corner out of sight of my dog, but he really did nothing. I heard him barking at us until we were a good distance away... after I, of course, had gotten my dog out of sight.

So I dunno, maybe handlers in general need more training before working a dog in a public place like this. I do know that being a K9 handler - at least in the police - is a privalidge and they usually promote cops to handlers based on politics and other things, not on dog skill or dog training talent/ability. It's really quite scary.

What a terrible story though, that poor little girl.

That's just horrible. I don't know quite what to think. I wonder if the dog had had enough experience and socialization around little kids or if something else about the environment provoked him. At any rate, it doesn't sound like a stable enough temperament in that individual dog to be used in such a way.

I saw something on TV once about dogs they were using at some airports and they were Beagles. They said, around people at busy airports, they are a good breed because they're usually not thought of as suspicious or aggressive. They're small and don't tend to intimidate people. And they have hella good noses for sniffing out contraband and explosives etc. Not saying that a Beagle is always, without variation never going to bite someone or that a Belgian Mal is always an aggressive dog. But they are big and they're a working breed, which can tend toward protectiveness and suspicion toward people, right? I know they use GSDs and other working breeds and usually everything is just fine. But maybe a smaller dog would be better around all those people because if one 'goes off,' at least it would be a smaller mouth.

Mostly, I think it depends on the individual dog's temperament and experience/training etc. The dog clearly wasn't well enough trained in releasing when told. That's just awful. Yeah, maybe muzzles would be an idea...just to be on the safe side.

Missed your post Lizzybeth. You made some good points about handler training and so on. That was really odd what happened to you with that dog acting like that and the handler not seeming to know what to do.

Mal's aren't known for stability. They're out there for sure. I know lots of them and they're all very nice. But lots of crap gets sold too. Couple too much dog with a handler that doesn't know what he has at the end of the leash and no experience and it can end badly, just like this.

I don't know what happened, but i have my ideas.

They use beagles at the Houston airport, my friend saw one working once and thought it was awesome.

That's what they mentioned in the article, but I don't understand: if the dog was trained ONLY for detection, like they alluded to, and ONLY had to sniff out drugs and explosives, AND had a passive alert, WHY would they have needed to teach him to release? Because to teach a release they'd also have to teach a grab, and there's no reason for that, right? I mean, my dog knows a release (we use it when we play tug), but if she ever bit a person the LAST thing on my mind would be to tell her "drop it"... cause she's never been trained to "drop" a person.

Maybe the trainers never taught the dog good bite inhibition (although, I'd argue that he still showed RELATIVELY good bite inhibition), or maybe he had never been socialized around kids, or maybe his temperment stability in crowds had not been evaluated enough, I don't know. But I wouldn't say that training a release would have been the answer here.

All I can think is that there may have been an odd odor on the poor child . Something's screwy though .... if they were waiting for a friend , why was the dog in that area ??

That's a good point. Why would a release be something they would need in detection work? Unless......the dog was trained in other things before, like Schutzhund. (?) I don't know much about this. But it is strange. I bet it has more to do with either lack of socialization, experience and/or lousy temperament, coupled with a wimp of a handler who couldn't seem to hold onto the leash. Hmmmm. weird. And horrible. I wonder if those parents will bring a law suit or something. It sounded like the mother was quite understanding. I'd be pissed!

Nothing screwy about it. The customs dogs can and do go to any part of the airport.

That's interesting you should mention that. I hear it a lot from people....connecting how an odor is affecting a dog's behavior toward them. "Oh....she must smell my dogs." Or..."I had chicken for lunch. That's why he's licking me." Or...."the dog can 'smell' fear and that's why he attacked." Of course, scents affect dogs in various ways, especially licking a chicken-smelling pant leg. LOL.

But....causing a dog to attack aggressively and bite someone because of an odor? I don't buy that. I don't buy that an odor should be a factor in whether a dog bites someone. No only should it not, I don't see the reasoning behind why it would. At least I've never come across it. I've had a few GSDs, Doberman....dogs that are known for a healthy suspicion of people. It's their job to be reserved and somewhat suspicious. But they never ever ever bit anyone or acted aggressively on account of an odor. And let me tell you...my son had some friends over who definitely had an odor, like the smell of pot or worse. I've worked with other peoples' dogs that had aggression issues, but odor never appeared to be a causative factor. Other things made more sense as a culprit. A change in odor made no difference. So, I just can't figure on that one.

A more probable cause would be that the dog wasn't being aggressive persay, but thought the child was prey, even though I think dogs know human from animal. Children are just plain different from humans. :rofl1:

If the "out" is sufficiently generalized, it should carry over to releasing a person.

.

But they're always on leashes, right? I think the handler didn't contol his dog well enough. He is to blame, needs more training and the dog should be taken out of the program. JMO.

Yeah...my dogs generalize "leave it" or "drop it" to everything pretty much.

Well yes. I agree. Having two malis, I can certainly understand how such a thing can happen. It's not always easy to be fast enough to stop them when they react to something.

Well then, they need a more physically fit handler for those dogs. Sheesh! I wonder if they do random drug tests on those drug enforcement guys....maybe he was on da chronic. LOL.

I had a very reactive, 90 lb Doberman and I could hold onto him. I'm only 5'3". I must be really strong. LOL. Thank goodness, he improved with age.

Not a matter of being more fit.

It's a matter of being more experienced and being able to see a small child, no that you have an undertrained mali, and staying far enough away that the dog can't reach the child if the dog suddenly finds his way to the end of the leash. And being able to maintain the dog's attention on something more appropriate. It's a matter of being in enough situations that you can anticipate what might happen in order to prevent it.

That said, I did once have Nyx land her front feet on the top of a child's head. Complete accident, and the child never seemed to notice, in fact no one seemed to notice, but it scared the hell out of me and was the last time she got within about 50 feet of a child. And Nyx had started out about 20 feet from the child, but the child decided to run - fast - past us, inches away. The whole thing happened so fast, I didn't have time to stop it and am always grateful that Nyx made no attempt to use her mouth.

Then it comes back down to, WHY are they using malis??

Probably for the intimidation factor. THey probably think a drug dealer is going to "oh man, I'm not smuggling with those dogs around!" vs "Pffft beagles. What ev."