SPCA's 9/11 mission: Help the dogs helping at Ground Zero
Roy Gross of the Suffolk SPCA, on Sept. 13, 2001, with a German shepherd in Lower Manhattan, one of many rescue dogs at Ground Zero treated by the organization 20 years ago. Credit: SPCA/Roy Gross
First, the canines who’d just spent hours searching the Ground Zero rubble for survivors, or human remains, would be dusted off.
"They were so full of contaminants that they couldn’t even smell anything anymore, so they had to be bathed, which we did," said Roy Gross, chief of the Suffolk County SPCA, recalling the organization’s work starting about 6 p.m. on Sept. 11, 2001.
Then those canines — including German shepherds and bloodhounds from the NYPD, and golden retrievers working as therapy dogs to comfort searchers — would be rehydrated, almost all intravenously, the weather being too scorching for drinking. Cuts or scrapes would be tended to, sutured if need be. Eyes irrigated with a saline solution. Bootees would go on paws unless the dogs panicked and rejected them.
Twenty years after the attacks, Gross recalled that warm late-summer day, which for him started on a Long Island golf course. It ended with him and a team from the Suffolk SPCA treating dogs that had searched the pile, and the next day, helping reunite owners with their pets in apartments near Ground Zero.
The Suffolk County SPCA's mobile MASH unit after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, parked on West Street in lower Manhattan. Credit: SPCA/Roy Gross
The team operated from a 40-foot mobile animal hospital intended for spaying and neutering cats and dogs on Long Island — a unit the agency began using a month or so earlier. By happenstance, Gross had decided to have the unit, which is still in use and has an operating room, bolstered as an emergency vehicle in case of a natural disaster — perhaps a wildfire — to treat animals.
"Never, ever thinking of anything like 9/11, of course, and I’m sure nobody did," he said.
The unit had yet to be used to spay or neuter a single animal.
Its first duty: 9/11 response, parked north of the felled towers, at Chambers and West streets.
Gross had been playing golf in Smithtown that Tuesday morning of Sept. 11, 2001, when SPCA colleague Gerald Lauber alerted him that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.
The team from the Suffolk SPCA quickly mustered and headed to lower Manhattan. The group, guided by some 200 veterinarians at Ground Zero, worked 12-hour shifts, or longer, for weeks, 24/7, Gross said.
"I always loved animals. I always had respect for animals. But since 9/11, I have a whole new respect for these dogs," he said.
There were 700 to 1,000 treatments of the dogs, said Gross, some whose officers were designated as special deputy United States marshals.
In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attack, the city government made all of lower Manhattan into a restricted zone. Pets were stuck in their owners’ homes. So Gross’ team also helped retrieve the animals, including a border collie, a schnauzer, a Labrador retriever, a Dalmatian, and even a bird, including from apartment buildings damaged in the attack. The rescued animals would then be given veterinary exams and sent on their way with their owners.
Only 20 people were found alive in the rubble, the final survivor 27 hours after the collapse of the north tower. A German shepherd named Trakr made the discovery, according to New York Magazine.
Lauber had found out about the attacks from his wife, who called while he was driving into the city. He pulled over on the Whitestone Expressway and saw the second plane hit.
Gross recalled his conversation with Lauber: "He said, ‘lock and load, we’re goin’ in.’ "
Lauber, who joined the agency after working as schools superintendent of South Huntington, said he worked at Ground Zero for 40 days. About 8 or 9 months later, Lauber said, he started developing what would become health ailments, now believed to be related to the airborne pollutants unleashed in lower Manhattan from the explosions and the collapse of then Twin Towers.
It started with a runny nose in spring and sniffling that never seemed to go away. Then sleep apnea.
"I have sinusitis, I have skin cancer, other than that, everything’s fine," Lauber said dryly.
Lauber, now 78 and of Jericho, was the agency’s chief of detectives and the incident commander for its search and rescue support operation in the 9/11 aftermath. He’s registered with the government’s fund for those sickened from the work.
"I felt I did some good by being there and coordinating and organizing the search-and-rescue support for the canines," he said. "So, it was my contribution to making America great again, a better place to be."
Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.
