Pawprints of Katrina

by Cathy Scott

  In the service, Don said, “Marines are like your brothers. You live with them and spend twenty-four hours a day with them.” That’s how it was for him in New Orleans. The real heroes of Katrina, he said, were “the volunteers, from fifty different states. They weren’t being paid. They did it on their own. That impressed me. The people who were cleaning the crates, rehabilitating the animals, taking care of them after we rescued them, they’re the heroes. Every single person who went down there made a difference. These people to me now are more like family than friends.”

  Don shut down his contracting business, a career he’d worked at for thirty years, to remain in New Orleans. “The animals were what the whole thing was about,” he said. “The one rescue I’ll always remember is a Pit Bull mix who came running down a corridor in a house, straight toward me. I thought he was going to attack me. But he ran as fast as he could, right past me, out the door, down the porch stairs . . . and jumped right into the Big Nasty [a Best Friends rescue vehicle]. He turned around in the van and looked at me like he was saying, ‘Let’s go.’ It made me laugh. He knew exactly why I was there. That was the easiest rescue I did. I’ll always remember it.” He’s worked on a few rescue efforts since. Doing anything else, for him, is no longer an option: “I’ll do this the rest of my life. I’ll never go back to contracting. I’m hooked on animals. How can we not help them? They’re helpless without us.”

  Barb Davis, a volunteer from Nebraska, worked with Don in the field. One day, in the Lower Ninth Ward, Barb told Don that she wanted to show him something she’d seen the day before. They walked to the spot. “Look at this,” she told him, pointing to a large pawprint. “That’s from a German Shepherd,” he told her. The dog was nowhere in sight. Early the next morning, however, Don returned to the Lower Ninth, this time with roast beef in hand. He sat down and waited. A while later, he spotted the dog, who did turn out to be a German Shepherd. “He growled at me,” Don said. “I tried to get him to come to me, but he kept growling. I got close enough, slipped a cloth loop-lead around his neck, and he came with me. That dog’s foot was bigger than my hand, but he only weighed fifty pounds. I named him Chance.” By the time Barb woke up that morning, Don was already back at the triage center with Chance. It was Don’s turn to show something to Barb. He walked her to the kennel where Chance was housed. He told her, “I got the German Shepherd.” Chance soon left the center for a German Shepherd rescue group to recover.

  Days like those in the field with fellow rescuers, Barb said, “were pretty special. Don and I will be friends for life.”

  For Carol Guzy, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist, staying in the region meant taking a leave of absence from her job as a staff photographer at the Washington Post. She had gone to the area with a reporter a week after the storm to cover the plight of the human refugees for the Post and was scheduled to return home after about a week. The pull of Katrina, however, caught her after she witnessed stranded animals. Instead of leaving, she remained in New Orleans for several months, but this time she was on her own. She hooked up with several groups, including the crews on U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service boats, who were assessing—but not rescuing—the animals. Like almost everyone down there, she operated on very little sleep. She went to Camp Tylertown a couple of times and, later, to the Celebration Station animal rescue center, from December until the end of February 2006, when it closed its doors.

  Cherie Fox and her husband quit their jobs in Ohio and moved to Mississippi so Cherie could work for the St. Francis Animal Sanctuary. She stayed there a year, “got it out of her system,” as she put it, and returned home to work on plans for starting her own sanctuary.

  After spending time in Tylertown and rescuing animals on the streets of New Orleans, John Hoenemeier, who worked in the computer industry in Los Angeles, decided he no longer wanted to “push a pencil.” Katrina showed him that. He moved to Kanab, Utah, to work for Best Friends and then trained in his spare time to become an emergency medical technician (EMT). Today, he works in Kane County, Utah, as an EMT.

  I, too, am included in that group of people who made split-second decisions about whether to stay at or leave Camp Tylertown. When Katrina hit, the semester had just started at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where I’d been teaching four classes each semester for five years as an adjunct journalism instructor. When I was asked to travel to the Gulf Coast, I enlisted substitutes for my classes and headed south for what I’d expected to be two and a half weeks. But at the end of that time, Best Friends asked me to stay on. Back then, I had no idea they would later offer me a full-time writing position. Still, without hesitation, I agreed to stay. I understood exactly why Chuck De Vito and John Hoenemeier didn’t want to return to their jobs, to what Chuck called “the real world.” The animal rescue effort wasn’t over. Pets were still in harm’s way, and the desire to stay and help them was a powerful magnet.

  Not everyone quit their jobs or relocated to other cities or states after helping the pets. Yet the experience for many was life-changing nonetheless. Cat Gabrel said that working with the displaced pets gave her a new outlook on life. “It changed the way I think about things and perceive the world,” she said.

  She traveled to Camp Tylertown in mid-September with her brother, Gary Gabrel, and his girlfriend. “Getting to go and help animals was the right fit for me,” she said. “It was so amazing. You had thousands of people showing up to help animals. They didn’t care what kind of animals they were. Everyone did everything they could, twenty-four hours a day. Nobody complained. It was life-changing.

  “If I regret anything,” Cat explained, “it’s that I didn’t work enough. It’s the best experience, besides childbirth, I’ve had.”

  10

  Red Gets His Wheels

  FOR THE MANY VOLUNTEERS who cared for a young, partially paralyzed dog named Red during his lengthy journey from the storm to finding a home, the disabled Staffordshire Terrier represented more than just a rescued Katrina victim. To them, Red was a mascot, the poster boy for Katrina pets. Volunteers embraced the handsome, red-nosed dog, and he returned the affection with vigor.

  After he was left homeless by Hurricane Katrina on August 29, 2005, Red hung out behind a New Orleans house where a resident going in and out of the area began leaving him food and water. But on November 5, Red was struck by a truck maneuvering the rubble-strewn street, leaving the dog paralyzed from his middle torso down.

  Many pets rendered paralyzed by a car accident are put down. When Red was first examined in early November at an emergency hospital, the vet and technicians hoped that it wouldn’t end in euthanization for this dog. When they realized Red had a huge will to live, that potential outcome was pushed aside.

  Red’s journey from the brink began on that cool November night. Bloody trail marks across pipes and debris on the road and driveway indicated that Red had dragged himself, possibly injuring himself further, back to the house where he’d been hanging out. He curled up behind a broken-down air-conditioning unit in the backyard. The owner of the house discovered the injured dog and phoned the Best Friends triage center at Celebration Station in Metairie, telling them it was an emergency. Two rescuers—Best Friends’ Jeff Popowich and volunteer David Halperin—were dispatched to the house.

  The two men rescued Red from his hiding place in the backyard. Conscious but in bad shape, Red simply lay there, looking up at them. Skin was missing from his shoulders and face, and he had lacerations all over his body. Worse, he did not appear able to move his back legs.

  David and Jeff lifted Red into a carrier and then rushed him to the Southeast Veterinary Specialists in Metairie, where Red would stay until early January. The hospital was serving as an emergency facility for Katrina pets. Red had fractures of the third vertebra and tenth rib. Besides the fractures, he had scrapes, cuts, and lacerations on his body, legs, and head. “He was beat up and in shock,” surgery technician Alice Louviere said. “He had the shakes, but he licked us. As I put his IV catheter
in, the whole time he licked my hand. Never one time did we consider putting Red down, just because of his spirit.” That Saturday night, Red had surgery; rods and a plate were attached to put his fractured vertebra back together and hold it in place. Best Friends paid for that, plus, according to Alice, a second procedure that was done to remove a rod that had shifted.

  Other dogs and cats also went to that hospital, which before the storm had been a veterinary clinic. After Katrina, it became an emergency hospital that continues to operate today. “We had tons of cats from Best Friends who weren’t eating,” Alice said. “At one time, we had thirty cats with feeding tubes, and they were all given a chance. God only knows what they’d been through. We had some for whom it would take a week to act like a dog or cat again.”

  Like Red, a cat named William Tell was given a second chance, one he lost two weeks later. His story was broadcast across the Internet. William Tell was rescued on January 3, 2006, by a team from Celebration Station who found him with an arrow in his chest. The arrow had gone through one side of his abdomen and exited through his chest. When William Tell arrived at the hospital, he was able to sit up, even though the arrow stuck out from either side. After surgery, he continued to do well and the prognosis looked good, but then he took a turn for the worse. “He started eating on January 7,” Alice said. Then, on January 15, he went into cardiorespiratory arrest. “We attempted to resuscitate him several times,” Alice said, “but we never got him back.”

  For Red, the outcome was the opposite. In the same hospital where the staff had tried so hard to save William Tell, Red spent the next two and a half months rehabilitating. A team that included veterinarians, vet techs, and surgery technician Alice took care of him. The veterinarian who performed the surgery was Dr. Rose Lemarie, a board-certified surgeon who owns the hospital with her husband.

  “We all had a very strong bond with Red, and there was not a dry eye when he left,” Alice said. “He was loved by all of us. When he left, we knew he was going to be taken care of, but he was here with us for three months. I spent many days and nights lying on the floor with him in our treatment room. He could always bring a smile to my face.”

  The hospital was the only one open in the area at the time. Its doors were kept open for rescue groups twenty-four hours a day during those first few months. “Animals such as Red,” Alice noted, “make us who we are.”

  Red’s caregivers manually moved his legs as part of his rehabilitation. They also used water therapy. The hospital has a heated indoor pool for rehab, and Red was able to go in the water after he had healed enough. Three times a week, a hydrotherapist worked with him in that pool. “He swam his behind off,” Alice said.

  David visited Red once a week at the hospital, and Red was always eager to play. For David, who stayed in the region for a few months to rescue pets, Red was the highlight of his trip. If he had done nothing else, he said, rescuing Red alone would have made the effort worthwhile.

  On January 9, 2006, Red was transferred to the Celebration Station triage center and had just a one-day return visit to the hospital in February for a bad case of mange. As soon as Red arrived at the triage center, volunteers doted on him, and some even put their sleeping bags in his playpen to spend the night with him. A laminated kennel card was attached to his pen (which was about ten by eight feet and just three feet high, making it easy for volunteers to step in and out to visit him). The card was an open invitation to volunteers.

  Hi! My name is Red. I am about a year and a half old and love attention. I was hit by a car in November 2005. They operated on my back, but I am still paralyzed in the hind end. I can’t control my bladder, so if I pee will you please help clean up.

  I like toys to chew on and people to pet me. Feel free to come and visit me!

  On January 11, for the first time, Red was let out of his playpen—a corner of the room at the former arcade—and allowed to scoot on his rump around the room. It happened on an evening when volunteers Tasha Corrigan and Fiona Archer of Toronto said their good-byes to fellow workers by throwing an after-dinner party. It was the last night of their five-day tour. They served up cheese, crackers, dip, and grapes to celebrate their time helping the animals. Diane Smith from Texas put a bouquet of flowers in the center of the mess table. Then a handful of people played a form of the television show Fear Factor to see who could eat the most fruit and vegetables.

  The highlight of the get-together, however, was when Red was allowed to scoot around on the floor and play with people and some of the staff’s foster dogs. For the first time since being released from the hospital, Red was mobile. Red’s face when he realized he was moving on his own steam and mingling with volunteers was a sight to see. One after the other, volunteers called Red to them. He slid up to one, then moved on to another. His face lit up as he scurried and scooted as fast as he could. Clearly, Red did not know he was disabled.

  The next morning, the world was introduced to the handsome, partially paralyzed dog after Best Friends posted on its Web site a story I wrote about Red that included a photo (taken by volunteer Barb Davis) of him playing with a toy. Several animal welfare sites picked up the story, marking the beginning of Red’s notoriety. New volunteers would walk into the triage center and ask, “Where’s Red?”

  It was clear Red needed to be more mobile so that he could go outside for exercise and fresh air. But he couldn’t scoot around on his rump outside on the pavement because he might hurt himself. A request went out and, at the Best Friends sanctuary in Utah, a couple of staffers went to work searching through donated items until they found an aluminum wheelchairlike cart for dogs. It looked like it would fit Red. The cart was immediately shipped to Celebration Station, and a couple of volunteers adjusted it to fit Red. When he got in the cart for the first time, the look on his face was almost one of surprise. It was as if he couldn’t believe it. He ran around in circles on the carpeted floor.

  Outside, on the blacktop road circling most of the Celebration Station building, Red ran like the wind. As if by instinct, he cornered and backed up in the large parking lot like he was Mario Andretti. As word spread at the triage center that Red had wheels, volunteers gathered outside, some with their hands over their mouths in amazement. Many had tears in their eyes. It was a pivotal moment in Red’s life. In the blink of an eye, he went from being an immobilized dog to running around on a road with people trying to keep up with him. He had a profound look of concentration on his face. Red was free. And he knew it.

  Everyone going in and out of Celebration Station knew about Red. They couldn’t miss him. When Red wanted attention, he would first bark quietly. If no one responded, it escalated to a howl. Volunteers would run to Red: “Poor boy,” they’d say to him. “What do you need, Red?” They’d step into his playpen and spend time with him. Best Friends staffer Mike Bzdewka, who ran the cat section at the center, often moved his sleeping bag to Red’s playpen and spent the night with him. Red soon figured out that howling, whimpering, and barking were his tickets to companionship.

  Red became even more famous when he led the Best Friends contingent at the February 2006 Barkus Parade through the French Quarter. When Red passed by the podium in his cart, a resounding cheer was heard. He wore a T-shirt, a dog jacket, and Mardi Gras beads, and looked proud as he marched through the streets. His debut at the parade was broadcast on the Internet via streaming video.

  Red was fostered out to Spindletop Pit Bull Refuge in Houston by its founder, Leah Purcell. Leah began dropping Red off for day care at the Longwood Animal Hospital and Pet Resort, a rehabilitation center for animals in Cypress. There, after weeks of therapy, Red got some feeling back and started wagging his tail for the first time. He also began sitting up for treats, bracing his weakest leg against a wall. Although he will always be paralyzed, these strides have helped him better maneuver when he’s not in his cart.

  A CNN news crew shot video of Red at Celebration Station, just before his transfer to Houston, and a broadcast of the vi
deo led to a permanent home for Red. The crew accompanying news-man Anderson Cooper stopped by the center and filmed Red scooting around inside, his feet and legs wrapped in gauze to prevent rug burns. A few days later, the piece aired on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 show. That’s how Diane McDermott from Boynton Beach, Florida, first learned about this special dog.

  Leah and Diane were put in contact with each other, and Diane applied to adopt Red. Leah enlisted a friend who lived nearby in Florida to do a home visit, to see what Red’s home environment would be like. Diane removed her bed’s box spring and put her mattress, which she covered in a plastic sheet, on her bedroom floor so Red could get onto it easily. She lined a kiddy pool with crib padding and filled it with toys. Then, on May 29, Diane drove two days and eleven hundred miles to Texas to pick up Red.

  Red couldn’t leave the Longwood day care without a big send-off, given that he had stayed there for nearly three months. While there, Red was doted on. During the day, he was moved from his kennel to veterinarian Lucy Gillespie’s office. Some nights and weekends, she even took Red home with her. During the week, employees regularly took him outside to play ball in his cart.

  It was a bittersweet good-bye. “Everybody is very attached to him,” Lucy said. “We all were crying. I’m going to miss him, but I’m also happy he’s going to have a one-on-one relationship with someone who has time to work with him. Diane is going to do great. That’s the whole point of fostering,” Lucy continued, “to prepare them for going into permanent homes.”