When disaster strikes, how and where do we evacuate our pets?
Fairfax County plans to accept a $200,000 Department of Homeland Security grant to find out, developing a regionwide plan for animal evacuation and shelter during a widespread emergency.
To some, the well-being of pets may appear relatively unimportant when compared with human safety. But Hurricane Katrina showed that disaster planners need to take into account not only people but their animals, said Michael Lucas, the Fairfax County Police Department’s chief animal control officer.
“What Katrina did do, is [DHS] saw that there were deaths directly attributed to the lack of planning for pets,” Lucas said. “People who wouldn’t leave their pets behind … they decided not to leave and they drowned.”
Fairfax County, the largest jurisdiction in the D.C. metropolitan area, will likely hire a contractor for the planning, which Lucas expects to take a year to 18 months to complete.
According to a county staff report, components of the plan will include identifying and documenting animal- care partners in the region, assessing existing emergency plans, developing a public information campaign, and designing and conducting an animal-evacuation exercise.
The plan would encompass the 19 jurisdictions within the scope of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, which includes Northern Virginia, Washington and suburban Maryland.
