Searching for Missing Persons with D.O.G.

Storyknife, May/June 2023 edition

Jim Pete with Bethel Search and Rescue dog named D.O.G. Photo courtesy Greg Lincoln/The Delta Discovery.

Sled dogs aren’t the only canine champs in the Y-K Region.

D.O.G., a nine-year-old St. Bernard-Labrador mix has been joining search and rescue missions all over western Alaska for the past six years.

D.O.G. even has a young nephew named Kenai who is in training as well.

It’s very unusual for a single search dog and its handler to work far away from a larger team of search dogs and handlers.

But Jim Pete, a 22-year veteran of Bethel Search and Rescue, was determined to train D.O.G. to assist western Alaska searches after talking to Wasilla dog team trainers who came to Shageluk to assist a search for a missing child.

“Dogs depend on scent. The quicker we can get to a scene is better than waiting too long,” Pete says.

“I got to talk [to the trainers] about D.O.G. and how to get properly trained. They took us on. They sent me a booklet, and eventually we were going to Wasilla for testing on tracking and trailing.”

Over the past six years, Pete and D.O.G. have assisted search and rescues in villages beyond the Bethel area, including Alakanuk, Emmonak, Chevak, Napaskiak, Akiachuk, Tununak, Kotzebue and Clark’s Point.

Pete says he is the one learning the most, since tracking comes naturally to D.O.G. “Our first year of training, I had trouble trusting him because I can’t smell the trail.”

Pete learned to do that after D.O.G. pulled him toward an area where Pete didn’t expect to find a victim. “Since then, I always trust him where he takes me.”

Though travel wasn’t possible during the pandemic, Calista has supported travel and training expenses for Pete and D.O.G. to attend dog search and rescue clinics offered through MAT+SAR Search & Rescue for several years.

“I want people in the Calista Region to know that we have a search dog out here. A lot of times, it’s a good thing to have. Down the road, I’d like to see more people interested and committed in helping with search dogs, and training their own,” Pete says.