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QuickTake:
For close to a year, the dogs are exposed to conditions and places that a blind person might navigate. An airport is a vital stop in their training.
A dozen puppy tails wagged back and forth in the security line at the Eugene Airport the afternoon of Saturday, Oct. 24.
It wasn’t all cute and cuddly: These dogs were in training for the organization Guide Dogs for the Blind.
There was a good bit of cute and cuddly, though.
The puppies were practicing navigating the airport, from check-in to the tarmac, in the first partnership between the airport and the organization.
“I have tons of [treats],” Rachelle Szilagyi, a puppy raising field manager for Guide Dogs for the Blind, told the group of puppy-raisers. “I’m talking sardines, beef liver, I got the stuff, OK?”
Some dogs might get overwhelmed with all the noise and chaos of an airport, so Szilagyi makes sure to have tons of positive reinforcements in case things go south with one of the dogs.
Not all positive reinforcement is food. “Good dog,” and other high-pitched, sing-songy affirmations were heard throughout the airport during the training..
Fergus, an 8-month-old black Labrador, and his puppy raiser, Alex Freemerman of Eugene, were among the participants in this new collaboration between the Eugene Airport and Guide Dogs for the Blind.
Fergus lay on the ground, with his big brown eyes gazing at people passing by. Freemerman said that food motivates the puppy, but overall is a relatively low-energy dog.
“We’ve been told that sometimes their first journey after their final training will be on a plane,” Freemerman said. “So this is a great opportunity for him to get that bit of experience.”
The two had been to the airport before, but Fergus hadn’t yet been through a Transportation Security Administration checkpoint.
First they checked into their “flight.” Fergus, of course, received a couple of treats along the way.
Then the dogs made their way through security. A few dogs got patted down once through the body scanner.
TSA stops at no one — or no puppy.
Finally they made their way to a gate and then out onto the tarmac. Once there, the dogs endured planes taking off, cargo holds being filled and various other distractions.
Not a single dog barked.
How the system works
Meredith Branch, the vollunteer puppy club leader for Guide Dogs for the Blind in Eugene, has been working with the organization for 11 years.
She isn’t raising a puppy right now, although she’s been a part of raising 10 different guide dogs.
“I’ve seen lots of different types of dogs, and now we have a pet dog because I got tired of all the dogs going away after a year,” Branch said.
She said that Guide Dogs for the Blind has a breeding campus in California where it breeds puppies. Professionals help determine which dogs get bred, and where they get located.
Once the puppies are about 8 weeks old, they are ready to get paired with a puppy-raiser.
“The job of the puppy-raisers is to just simply teach the puppy good manners and provide socialization experiences, so that the puppy over time will get comfortable in all the different types of environments that a blind person might need to go to,” Branch said.
That’s where the airport comes in. It’s one of a number of exposure exercises that puppy-raisers bring their puppies to.
A future partnership
Andrew Martz, the assistant airport director for the Eugene Airport, said that a lot of productive meetings helped make Saturday’s event possible.
“TSA gets training, Alaska Airlines, our partner for this event, gets training and the dogs get training too,” Martz said.
He said he’s hoping to make this an annual event.
Karen Woon, the vice president of Guide Dogs for the Blind seconded that, citing how smoothly the event ran.
“The hope is that maybe next year they can board an actual plane,” she said.
