(Newswire.net — September 11, 2014) — It was discovered on Tuesday afternoon when a woman travelling through the airport was given the suitcase to replace her own, which had been damaged during her flight.
She got home to Cessnock, Australia, before discovering what had been hidden in it. When she took the case to the local police station, officers evacuated the building.
“The device was not live,” the AFP said in a statement today. “Officers temporarily evacuated the building as a safety precaution.”
Sniffer dog who left the plastic explosive behind is now headed for the doghouse and is suspended.
“The AFP takes this error seriously and the canine instructor who inadvertently left this device behind has been identified and will be the subject of a formal Professional Standards Investigation,” AFP Sydney Airport Commander Wayne Buchhorn said.
“Although the travelling public was not in danger at any time, we regularly review our processes in this area, and we will do again in the light of this incident.”
“This type of training is essential for our canine teams, allowing the dogs to experience potential threats in a real environment.”
“On behalf of the AFP, I would like to thank the woman, her family, and the New South Wales Police, especially officers at Cessnock Police Station, for their assistance in this matter.” Buchhorn said.
A detection dog, or sniffer dog is a dog that is trained to and works at using its senses (almost always the sense of smell) to detect substances such as explosives, illegal drugs, wildlife scat, or blood.
Hunting dogs that search for game and search dogs that search for missing humans are generally not considered detection dogs.
Sniffer dogs have also been enlisted to find bumblebee nests. The Bumblebee Conservation Trust has trained an English Springer Spaniel to detect the colonies, assisting them with the conservation of threatened species.
Other studies have employed detection dogs for the purposes of finding and collecting the feces of a diverse array of species, including caribou,[2] black-footed ferret, killer whale, and Oregon spotted frog.