Last Wednesday, the Canine Search and Rescue Unit of the Association of Municipalities of the Almanzora Valley, Didugal, received a request for help from the competent authorities to travel to the province of Valencia in order to collaborate in the search for missing persons.
On Thursday, already at ground zero of the catastrophe, “instructors and search dogs worked in specific areas of the town of Utiel and today, Friday, we are more in the direction of Valencia, specifically in the municipality of Chiva, perhaps one of the most affected areas. We are checking areas of the A-3 in the direction of Valencia and Madrid, where there were several people who were swept away by the water,” María Rubio, one of the people in charge of Didugal, told Comarca Noticias.
“This Friday morning, one of the missing people was found and there are still many people in this area who are yet to be found.” Regarding her search routine, Rubio explains that “our job is to report to the command post of the town in question first thing in the morning, where we are assigned an area to check with the dogs for the appearance of human remains, areas where it is presumed there may be victims. If we find someone, we immediately notify them so that the UME comes to clear the rubble and, if necessary, to extract the body. We also notify the Civil Guard so that they can communicate with the judicial commission. This morning (Friday) we removed a body between the median strips of the road and an industrial estate. The landscape is devastating,” says this well-known dog trainer in our region.
