Nonprofit Who Trains Dogs to Find Missing People in Colorado
Dogs are, generally speaking, great animals for countless reasons - they're loyal, make great pets/companions, are intelligent, fun to be around, and oftentimes, can be extremely helpful, too.
When things go wrong, or when somebody is in need of serious help, law enforcement groups are constantly looked at for assistance in various situations.
In Colorado, however, even law enforcement officers look to others for help - and that help often comes from a local Colorado non-profit called Bloodhound Man Trackers.
About Bloodhound Man Trackers
Bloodhound Man Trackers is a non-profit organization that provides trained and proven bloodhound K9 teams for law enforcement use, based out of Kiowa, CO.
According to the non-profit's official website, Frank Hurst, Al Nelson, Brian Eberle, and Marlene Groves founded the group back in 2014 in an effort to keep these amazing K9s as a resource for those agencies that no longer had or could afford to have a team for use.
Over the last eight years, 9News says that four special dogs with the non-profit, whose names are Copper, Carline, Isabelle, and Hiccup, along with their four handlers - none of whom gets paid - have worked for about 65 different agencies on nearly 200 cases, many of them high-profile murder cases.
"There aren't many agencies in Colorado that have a full-time bloodhound unit for tracking down bad guys and finding the lost and missing," said Brian Eberle, vice-president of Bloodhound Man-Trackers.
"If there's a need, they'll call Bloodhound Man-Trackers."
The handlers and their dogs train every Monday for a few hours to hone and maintain each dog's remarkable ability to find human remains and living humans, 9News said.
"They see everything you see, they smell everything 60 million times better than you," said Frank Hurst, the president of Bloodhound Man-Trackers and a former investigator with the Elbert County Sheriff's Office.
"I'm glad I can't smell like they do; that would be horrible."
According to Frank, it's the part of the work that makes all the hours of training, and the many tracking miles worthwhile.
"When you find that one person, even if you find only one in your entire career, what an amazing feeling, "Hurst said.
To find out more about this incredible non-profit, visit the Bloodhound Man Trackers official website here.