No Buddy Left Behind: Bringing U.S. Troops' Dogs and Cats Safely Home From the Combat Zone (25 page)

Doug Crowe, one of the SLG Operations Managers in Baghdad, focused on logistics. He needed to know the location of every animal and to work with the owners to agree on a pickup time and location. Only four dogs could be delivered to BIAP by their owners. That left twenty-six animals for the SLG team to collect while logging hundreds of miles in armored vehicles. Before his men could even leave the gates of the SLG compound, Doug had to submit movement requests to the U.S. Military Central Command (CENT COM), giving full route disclosure seventy-two hours in advance. Pinpointing the animals' location became one of Doug's greatest challenges. Soldiers weren't always available to correspond, yet they were the only people who could relay the animals' specific whereabouts.

Whereas FedEx was able to cover the cost of moving the animals, Gryphon was a much smaller airline and could not afford to fly the animals at no charge to SPCA International. It would cost approximately $35,000 to charter the Gryphon plane. Inevitably many other expenses of such a huge undertaking would also have to be covered. The team challenge for SPCA International, therefore, was to bring in donations. Public awareness was paramount, and individual response to each offer of fundraising projects or volunteer help was essential but also incredibly time-consuming. SPCA International staff and volunteers were giving it their all.

Another equally important matter was what we would do with the animals after they landed in New Jersey. We couldn't just unload a bunch of crates on the tarmac and hope someone would take over from there. An arrival team was needed. While trying to resolve this problem, I thought of Dena DeSantis, the high school guidance counselor whose animal rights club girls had raised $11,000 for Operation Baghdad Pups missions. Dena lived close to Newark Liberty International, and she had proven herself to be another "cando" person. Her challenge was to locate a holding facility on or near the airport.

While Dena worked on the shelter, I got busy gathering a team of volunteers who had worked with me in disasters and had the kind of specialized experience needed to care for the Iraqi animals until every one of them was picked up by its owner or transferred onto another homeward-bound flight.

My next task involved shopping. Only two of the owners had crates in Iraq that were suitable for their animal's journey, so I quickly placed an order for twenty-eight airline crates from Drs. Foster and Smith Pet Supplies and asked for shipping to Bev and Barb's house. The crates would have to fly as checked baggage. I couldn't begin to imagine how hefty that charge would be.

Difficult decisions also had to be made that would involve exposing another person to potentially devastating circumstances. This wasn't something I could take on without consulting my boss. On May 18, I called JD with my latest update.

"I can't do this alone, JD. Someone has to go with me. The other person needs to have the right kind of experience and a good head on their shoulders. You see, this time we won't be going in and out of BIAP on the same flight. We'll have to stay in Baghdad for three days."

"Where? At the airport?"

"No, we'll be at the SLG compound in central Baghdad."

JD went quiet while he digested this news. "Isn't that in the Red Zone?"

The Red Zone was any part of the city that was outside of American fortified boundaries and was considered a high-risk, no-go area. People who lived in the Red Zone spent most of their time indoors; many were afraid to go to work, attend school, or do their shopping. Countless numbers of stores and businesses had been closed; schools had been taken over by coalition forces or destroyed. Being kidnapped, injured, or worse were risks that had to be seriously considered. Just recently, ninety-nine people had been killed in a central Baghdad market when two women with bombs strapped to their bodies committed suicide.

"Yes, it's in the Red Zone," I said. "I will admit, JD, the realization that we'd have to stay outside the confines of the U.S. Air Force base at BIAP took some getting used to, but we can't avoid it. With the number of animals SLG will be transporting to its compound, I have no choice but to go and take care of them, and that's going to be a job one person couldn't possibly handle on her own." I waited several seconds for his response.

"Who are you thinking should go?" JD asked. "Although the more realistic question is probably, who is willing to go?"

"Bev Westerman. She's had years of animal rescue experience. I've worked with her during disasters, and I know I can depend on her."

"She agreed while knowing the risks?"

"Yes, with SLG security looking out for us, we'll be well protected. After all, that's what they do when they aren't rounding up animals for SPCA International."

JD let out a loud sigh. "To be honest, Terri, I'm nervous enough about you going into a Red Zone, let alone asking a volunteer to take that risk as well. I'd never be able to live with myself if anything happened to either of you. Is there no other way?"

"Not if we want to bring these animals home before the embargo, and that means certain death for most of them. I know it sounds potentially dangerous, JD, but believe me, if I wasn't sure that the guys at SLG could keep Bev and me totally safe, I wouldn't risk it. It's a hard decision to make, I know, but I need you to back me up."

I waited what seemed like an eternity until JD finally made his decision. "Okay," he said, "in the few months we've worked together, I've learned to trust your judgment. Go ahead and make your plans, but make sure you come back safe and sound." I appreciated my boss's confidence more than he would ever imagine. Before we finished our conversation, I briefed JD on the other details. We had three target dates for departure from Iraq. So far they were May 28, 29, or 30. Dave was still working on this part of the plan with FedEx employees in the Middle East. We had less than two weeks to succeed or fail. Thank God, none of us were quitters.

Another critical task came up on May 22, 2008, in an e-mail from Dave Lusk that he'd flagged as "urgent." His message arrived on the morning I was planning to fly home to California for my daughter Amy's graduation.

Terri,

How soon can you get ten-year federal background checks done on you and Bev? They need to be accompanied by a digital photograph and two government IDs, then returned with the attached FedEx form fully completed. We need these ASAP for Transportation Security Administration (TSA) as well as internal FedEx security or you can't fly aboard our plane.

- Dave

I called Bev at work. "Guess what we have to do now?"

"Hard telling," she laughed, considering how many times I had called her with addendums to plans we thought were already set. Thank goodness for Bev's easygoing manner.

The first thing I did was postpone my flight to Sacramento. Bev and I immediately initiated background checks online through USSearch.com. By the next day we were relieved to discover that neither of us had dark secrets lurking in the closet, and I was able to fax the required documents to Dave.

On May 24 I flew to California and made it to Amy's graduation ceremony just in the nick of time. Our youngest daughter, Megan, sat between Ken and me as we waited for the graduating students to walk in. "It's a good thing you made it home, Mom. If you hadn't, Amy would have been really disappointed. She was so worried you weren't going to see her receive her diploma."

Her words struck my heart, thinking about the number of times I had missed out on important dates for my girls, but I couldn't help comparing the relatively small sacrifices my family made with those of the soldiers' families. Their loved ones went away for months or years at a time, missing all those special family days. All too often when soldiers finally came home from the war zone, they seemed like strangers or were damaged in some way.

That evening, before I boarded the last flight out of Sacramento, I thanked my family for their support and told my girls how proud I was of them.

The next morning Dave e-mailed to say he was fairly certain that FedEx's requested stopover in Paris, France, would be possible, provided the animals remained in the crates, on netting-wrapped pallets, and would stop at Charles de Gaulle Airport for less than twentyfour hours. All veterinary paperwork would have to be up-to-date and accompany the animals. Dave then recommended that I ask John to arrange the Gryphon flight from Baghdad (BIAP) to Dubai for June 2. I should have been excited to settle on a date, but I was still somewhat gun shy at that point. There had been too many ups and downs to tally in the previous days.

I walked to the window overlooking Bev and Barb's back yard. Eight rescued Operation Baghdad Pups dogs had left a circular trail in the grass where they had become acquainted with the new sights, smells, and sounds during their first days in America. Seeing that path made me believe there would soon be twenty-eight more dogs doing the same thing. It was time to get this show on the road.

Immediately I e-mailed the owners to announce we would be departing from BIAP on June 2, leaving at midnight and arriving in Dubai at 3:00 a.m. Flying during the coolest time of the day would avoid the problems associated with hot temperatures. Bev and I would travel with the animals all the way and bring squirt bottles for cooling them down if necessary. They would also have plenty of food and water for the trip. I ended the e-mail with our planned itinerary for the rest of the flight with stops in France and England and our final destination of Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey at 11:00 p.m. on Tuesday, June 3.

"Do you know what we're going to do with all the animals when we arrive in Newark?" Bev asked.

"Dena has made progress. This morning she sent me this." I read Dena's e-mail out loud:

We have been given the use of a heated/air-conditioned warehouse by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The facility is located on the airport property. There will be volunteers standing by to pick up the animals once they land and transport them to this location. In the morning, a veterinarian will come to examine each of the animals and issue domestic health certificates for those that are flying the rest of the way home. When the vets are finished, there will be several mobile groomers arriving. They offered to get the animals all spruced up for the final leg of their journey home.

"That's wonderful news! I can't wait to meet all the animals," Bev said. "I'm getting really excited thinking about them now and wondering how it's all going to pan out. How many did we have at last count?"

"A second ago I thought we had confirmed twenty-six dogs and four cats," I said after glancing at my next e-mail. "But wait a minute ... it looks like the number has changed again."

Although Dena's accomplishment had been a huge relief, the universe seemed determined to keep testing us in a wide variety of ways. The e-mail I had just finished reading arrived from a soldier whose cat named "Dexter" was one of the animals on our list.

Hi Terri,

I think we have a problem. It appears that my cat Dexter also belongs to someone else trying to get him to the States. I have attached his photo above. I believe the other soldier calls him "Burt." What are we going to do?

-John Norris

In a combat zone where teams work on rotation and soldiers are continually on the move, mix ups like this could happen. I require, as part of the Operation Baghdad Pups application process, that a current photo of each animal be sent to me. Until that afternoon John had not sent one. Rules are rules, but I was learning with this program that I had to know when to bend them. Holding up a rescue for lack of a temporarily unobtainable photo made no sense. It wasn't until that afternoon that I received a picture of Dexter and could compare the two pictures.

"Bev, can you grab my active file and pull out the print of Burt's photo? It seems there may be one less cat to transport."

Sure enough, as Bev and I studied the photograph that Erin had sent a few weeks before, we agreed that John's orange tabby shared the same markings as Burt. We looked at each other and started to laugh. Out of all the things that could go wrong, this was perhaps the best kind of mishap we could possibly have. Before I did anything else, I had to write back to John and deal with the awkward dilemma.