‘Devastation was really bad’
MORE than 46 000 people have been killed by the two earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria and thousands of people have been displaced.
As part of South Africa’s aid effort, the SAPS’s K-9 search-and-rescue team was deployed to Türkiye. The team consisted of five K-9 dogs, their handlers as well as a team leader. They departed for Türkiye on February 9 and returned to South Africa on Saturday.
The team led numerous search operations for survivors and helped to recover the bodies of the deceased.
Warrant Officer Keegan Naidoo is a K-9 search-and-rescue handler attached to the Johannesburg K-9 unit in Gauteng.
Naidoo, 41, who is originally from Phoenix in Durban, relocated to Johannesburg in 2002 after joining the Mondeor SAPS flying squad. The father of two joined the K-9 unit in 2006.
“I became the first Indian searchand-rescue handler in Gauteng in 2018. My dogs at the time were Jason and Nero, who were both German shepherds. They were responsible for patrol and detecting explosives. My current dog is Aida, a 6-year-old Belgian Shepherd,” said Naidoo.
“Our previous mission together was during the floods in KwaZulu-Natal last year. That mission stood out for me because I grew up in KZN, so it was close to my heart and my family still live there.”
He said each handler was allocated a dog and the dog belonged only to that handler.
“It is their sole responsibility to take care of the dog. I have an outstanding relationship with Aida and we work wonderfully as a team because we both have energetic personalities.”
Naidoo said Türkiye was his first international deployment.
“We were deployed to the main town of the disaster, Antakya in the province of Hatey. The devastation was really bad. To see the damage and emotions in real life was depressing.
“South African search-and-rescue dogs are the only dogs in the world that can detect people who are alive and dead. This is why our dogs were in high demand in Türkiye as opposed to other teams’. Other countries train dogs separately, one dog for the living and another for the dead.
“As a team, we normally work day and night and weekends, but in Türkiye due to safety issues, the Turkish government did not allow us to do so.
“From the dogs’ indications, we found about 25 deceased and were only able to find one victim alive.
“Our dogs indicated on more sites but we’re not sure if more bodies were recovered. We were in high demand, so the dogs indicated the spots, we marked the areas and moved on to other sites. We left the recovery teams to extract the victims.”
The South African search-and-rescue
team also worked with an Omani Team to rescue an 80-year-old woman. The operation to recover the woman with the Gift of the Givers team took about three hours.
“The Oman team used a live detector first and then rescue dog Optimus was used to verify. It took the team around two to three hours to rescue the old lady. As living victims are rescued, they are immediately treated by medics and rushed to nearby hospitals.
“It was an amazing feeling to work with the Gift of the Givers team as well as the other countries that were involved, because everyone came for the same purpose. The people of Türkiye were outstanding in their services and hospitality although they faced such a horrific challenge.”
The South African K-9 search and rescue team’s leader was Brigadier Vimla Moodley, 51, from East London.
Moodley is the first black woman K-9 handler in the country and is currently the highest-ranking woman in the K-9 search and rescue.
Moodley said: “When we landed in Türkiye, it was a shocking visual. TV and reality are totally different. The stunning city of Antakya was wiped out. All the buildings are in ruins.
“The saddest part were the survivors. They are living on the streets, hoping for loved ones to be recovered. They are holding onto some possessions they were able to salvage from the rubble.
“This mission was both an amazing and sad experience. This is my first lead mission and it was an honour to be appointed by the national commissioner to lead this exceptional group.
“This mission was very different from those I’ve worked on before. It’s the first time the K-9 search-and-rescue dogs were deployed to such a disaster.”