The public is invited to sniff out the secrets of human-remains detection dogs this Saturday at the Historic Echo Church.
Kamas resident and former FBI agent Sonja Nordstrom will give a free “Death by Powerpoint” lecture and unleash a live demonstration at 4 p.m. with her Dutch Shepherd dogs, Viggo, 7, and Vika, 1.
“I’ve put together a presentation that kind of explains what the dogs do,” said Nordstrom, president and handler for Great Basin K-9 Search and Rescue/Forensic K-9 Response Team. “People hear ‘search dog,’ and they all just think of avalanche dogs or dogs that respond to natural disasters or man-made disasters, so the presentation, with lots of pictures, explains the different disciplines are in the dogs that find humans, versus dogs that detect drugs and bombs.”
Even in the human-detection realm, there are dogs that are assigned to avalanches, wilderness rescues, classic bloodhound tracking and a whole spectrum for what Nordstrom calls “cadaver dogs.”
“Cadaver dogs are usually out there searching for the people who recently have fallen prey to the environment or have taken their own lives or have been victims of crimes,” she said. “(Those situations), over many years, can turn into locating historic human remains.”
Another developing vocation for these dogs is survey work, according to Nordstrom.
“This work tends to take place in cemeteries like the one at Echo, where there are likely unmarked graves,” she said. “This is a multi-disciplined approach that includes the dog as well as ground-penetrating radar and other technical devices that will basically confirm there is something under there. You don’t want to exhume everything.”
” data-image-caption=”
Two Dutch Shepherds from the Great Basin K-9 Search and Rescue/Forensic K-9 Response Team will be part of a non-invasive demonstration on Saturday. The public is invited to the presentation, which is free.
” data-medium-file=”https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?fit=300%2C200&ssl=1″ data-large-file=”https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?fit=780%2C520&ssl=1″ src=”https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=780%2C520&ssl=1″ alt class=”wp-image-132388″ srcset=”https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=1024%2C683&ssl=1 1024w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=300%2C200&ssl=1 300w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=768%2C512&ssl=1 768w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=1536%2C1024&ssl=1 1536w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=2048%2C1366&ssl=1 2048w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=1200%2C800&ssl=1 1200w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=1568%2C1046&ssl=1 1568w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?resize=400%2C267&ssl=1 400w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1.jpg?w=2340&ssl=1 2340w, https://i0.wp.com/www.parkrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/20231009-DJXS2954-scaled-1-1024×683.jpg?w=370&ssl=1 370w” sizes=”(max-width: 780px) 100vw, 780px”>
This work starts with research, said Nordstrom.
“Of course, you do the review and do everything you can in finding historical documents because, in the early days, many graves were marked with a wooden marker, which are gone in one fire,” she said. “Also, when you’ve got a hillside like Echo, there is the potential for slide activities and ground settling.”
Plus, there is the time-related gradient between those who disappeared yesterday to the people in many of the graves that are hundreds of years old, Nordstrom said.
“So we will do the powerpoint that explains these things, and then we’ll go out to see if the dogs can identify some of the graves,” she said.
Sometimes the success of locating remains depends on conditions.
“Hot and dry environments change the available odor for the dogs,” she said. “So, if nothing else, I’ll bring some samples of things that the dogs will use to see what they can find.”
Nordstrom, who periodically resurrects her mostly dormant podcast, K9 Top Tales, has always loved dogs, but the idea to work with them in locating human remains hit her 30 years ago while attending a firearm training workshop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
“I saw all of these random dogs working at a fire academy area, so of course, I marched over there and asked what they were doing,” she said. “The primary trainers were an older couple who were very experienced, and that was what got me into search training. My first training day was April 15, 1995.”
A year later, Nordstrom moved to California, where she hooked up with the police K9 units and volunteer organizations.
“My leaning is toward criminal cases, trying to locate homicide victims,” she said. “I also located disarticulated remains — those that were taken apart by predators — and found that cattle will also disarticulate remains. They’ll push things around and use them as salt licks, which is different from teeth marks from what rodents do. And that is different from what coyotes do and that differs from what wolves do. Now we have wolverines.”
A few years later, Nordstrom joined the FBI and worked with the evidence response team for 23 years.
Some of her assignments included excursions to Mexico, Saudi Arabia and the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, after the hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the building during the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
“I was deployed when I was an FBI agent for recovery a week after FEMA teams determined they weren’t going to find anyone else alive,” she said. “Teams were brought out to find remains of those from the plane and building so they could be identified through DNA.”
Over the years, Nordstrom has seen the search-and-rescue process evolve due to technology.
“When I first started, we would cover areas with maps and compasses because GPS didn’t exist,” she said. “Now, dogs have GPS collars, so we can see what coverage the dogs get.”
Mobile phones also didn’t exist during Nordstrom’s early work.
“Now, people with cellphones have satellite connections,” she said. “So there is more rescuing and less searching because people are calling and telling us where they are.”
Nordstrom moved to Utah to be closer to family and settled in Kamas. Twelve years ago, she was asked to assist History Flight, a nonprofit organization that specializes in “research, recovery and repatriating Missing In Action Servicemen,” she said.
“I was asked to locate the remains of soldiers from World War II in France and Germany, and to prepare for that, I started working at burial sites at some of the pioneer cemeteries,” she said. “So, I contacted the people at Echo Cemetery and asked if I could do that.”
Nordstrom explained the process is respectful and non-invasive because the dogs don’t dig.
“(It’s about) the idea of an undisturbed surface that still had odor pluming from (it) that gets the dogs to deeply use their noses,” she said. “That’s how the partnership with the Echo Church began.”
Nordstrom, who retired from the FBI in 2014, still keeps in touch with most of her mentors and coaches who helped throughout her career.
“I can still contact them to pick their brains and learn,” she said. “Also, with the internet there are so many trainers and so much to learn in the little corners of the Earth.”
With all of this information available at her fingertips and her dogs’ noses, Nordstrom believes the day she stops learning is the day she stops working.
“But this is such intriguing work because, 30 years later, I’m still saying, ‘I haven’t come across that, yet,’” she said with a laugh.
‘Death by Powerpoint’ and Human-remain Detection Dog Demonstration with Sonja Nordstrom
This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
