Almost every day, beginning August 26, 2011 (the day after Jack went missing), I have spent some time wishing I had done something different.  Wishing I had INSISTED that I fly out to Cali with Karen, each of us taking one cat under the seat.  Wishing I had gone up to New York to look at her cat carriers myself.  Wishing I had told her to take Jack under the seat and let Barry fly cargo.  Wishing, wishing, wishing… but as the old saying goes, “if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.”  I could be riding a whole stableful of horses right now.

But instead, I’ve learned sooooooo much…

• I’ve learned that airlines really do consider companion animals to be luggage.
• I’ve learned that there are a whole bunch of different entities that have a voice in if and how lost animals are searched for when they are lost in an airport.
• I’ve learned that there are a few laws in place to protect animals that are being transported; and like all laws, sometimes they are violated.  These violations seem to have almost no punishment attached to them.
• I’ve learned that there are an awful lot of people out there that are willing to give their heart to a cat they’ve never met in person.
• I’ve learned that keeping animals safe when they travel by air is a much bigger and more complex problem than I ever would have imagined.

Now if I had just gone up to NYC and flown with Karen, Barry, and Jack out to Cali, I never would have learned all this.

BUT I DIDN’T.  I DIDN’T PREVENT THE PROBLEM WHEN I COULD HAVE.

So instead of having two anonymous cats living happily in the California sunshine, we now have one poster boy for safety in pet air travel, a Facebook page with 25,000 followers, and a new non-profit  that seeks to make sure Jack is not just another statistic on a “redacted” report to the government.

If I had prevented this from happening all these ”exciting” developments wouldn’t have happened.

What is even more important, though –  if I had prevented this from happening, a very frightened Jack wouldn’t have spent 61 days crawling around in the ceiling at JFK airport, hungry and thirsty and alone.

And that is why we keep going on this mission.

Luckily, there is some good news… we have made some progress!  Alaska Airlines did an amazing job looking for (and finding!) Wenty!!  And Byrdie the Rhodesian Ridgeback was retrieved from the runway at La Guardia before tragedy struck!!

And yet, I still think about Jack – and what he went through during the last 73 days of his life –  every day.  And I also think about the dogs that have escaped from their crates and have run out into the world, scared out of their wits, looking for their families, unsafe and – far too often – unlucky.  Vivi.  Nahla.  Tosha (who was a lucky one).

But all those animals give us a focal point.  If our quest is successful – if we keep the animals SAFE – there will be no more focal points.  No more drama, no more “poster kids” like Jack, like Wenty, like Nahla, like Tosha.

GOOD.  I hope, with everything in my body and soul, that we never have to report on another lost dog or cat at an airport ever again.

Unfortunately, without these “poster kids,” it’s hard to make that dream a reality.  It’s hard to convince people to put themselves out there to PREVENT another sad story.

If I ask you to give $10, or $25, or $100 dollars to help keep a sweet kitty or puppy with big eyes and huge ears alive, it’s a pretty easy call.

But if I ask you to donate the same amount to help us print posters that will go in every vet’s office in the U.S., to help pay the fee for a table at a veterinary conference so that we can spread the word about the dangers of air travel to the people who certify that a dog or cat is healthy enough to fly, or to cover expenses for a trip to Washington to really talk to people that can help us create a safer system, weeeeeeeellllllll…

Those things just aren’t CUTE.  And there will be no story with a happy ending.  Because – if this works – there will be no more stories at all.

I am absolutely 100% certain that if all of us don’t think at least a little bit ahead… if we don’t make air travel for animals safe… if we don’t take a stand and say IT IS NOT ALRIGHT TO TREAT ANIMALS LIKE LUGGAGE, what happened to Jack will happen over and over and over again.  And there will be more pretty kitties and darling doggies who will be lost, injured and killed as a result of air travel.  We’ll look at their pictures and we’ll worry or we’ll cry — but ultimately, these fur-kids will be the ones who pay for our unwillingness to think ahead, to think beyond the story of the cute animal in front of us right now.

When we began Where Is Jack? Inc. (“we” are a core group of determined and concerned volunteers, who all met online as a result of Jack’s plight), we drew up a preliminary budget.  We need about $50,000 to do just the basics of what we’re hoping to do in the next year…

• to go to national and regional veterinary conferences, to talk to vets about the realities of air travel for pets in checked baggage or cargo – since they are the ones who must certify that a dog or cat is healthy enough to fly;
• to print and distribute posters and information cards in the 50,000 veterinary practices in the U.S.; and
• to get to DC to work with people who are willing and able to help us make sure what happened to Jack NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN.

But WE NEED YOUR HELP to make this happen.  To those of you who have become a member of Where Is Jack? Inc. already,  we thank you.  Please ask all your animal-loving friends to join you in supporting this work!!  And if you haven’t yet become a member…

Remember the 61 days Jack was in the ceiling, hungry and alone.  Remember the 12 days he was in veterinary ICU, with that tube in his nose.

Remember that ultimately, he couldn’t survive his ordeal, and that he is now watching us from the other side of the Rainbow Bridge.

Help us print the posters, go to the conferences, and change the laws so that his suffering will never, ever happen again.

It won’t make what Jack went through”worth it,” but at least it won’t make his death another utterly pointless tragedy in the history of animals on planes.

So, it’s happened again – another animal has gone missing as a result of airline mis-handling (this time the airline is LOT Polish Airlines).  On Tuesday, May 15, Tosha went missing from LOT checked baggage/cargo and her people were told she was missing after they had boarded the plane.

And on top of this, the Friends of Jack have heard rumors (still unconfirmed) that another dog went missing from a different airline the previous week.

REALLY????

So what did anybody who works in the airline industry at JFK or the Port Authority (JFK’s governing body) actually learn from Jack’s ordeal??  Or for that matter, from any of the animals that have been lost as a result of airline mishandling?

Clearly, they did not learn that COMMUNICATION is critical to finding the lost pet.

The team of searchers from Heavenly Angels Animal Rescue (the agency that placed Tosha with her family, who had boarded that LOT plane), and searchers Bonnie Folz and Angela Vitucci (FoJs), found that the Port Authority Police AND employees of LOT airlines were unaware that a dog had been lost on airport grounds.  They were unaware of this 48 hours after Tosha had gone missing!!!

Jack went missing on the evening of August 25, 2011.  Before dawn on the morning of August 26, I spoke to a very nice woman at an AA call center who gave me the direct dial number to JFK baggage.  I began calling them at 7am.  I spoke to the supervisor there at 730am – and the baggage supervisor was totally unaware that Jack had been lost! To say I was horrified was an understatement. There was a cat lost in his baggage area, and he didn’t even know to look for it!!

Surely, this was just a problem with AA. Other airlines had to be more together than this.

But it seems not.

After a two month period in which we’ve seen 3 – and possibly 4 – dogs be in danger as a result of air travel, it just becomes clearer and clearer that the system isn’t really working to keep our pets safe.

Now I hear the naysayers – “How many dogs and cats have travelled through just the New York City airports in the last 2 months?  And there have only been 3 (well, maybe 4) incidents?  That’s not so bad, really…”

Of course, if you think pets are just “things” – no different from a sofa or a laptop or a purse – you’d be right.  I’m sure that far more than 3 (or maybe 4) pieces of luggage have been mishandled at LGA and JFK in the last two months.

But I refuse to accept that our loving, loyal, smart, devoted COMPANIONS are no different than a laptop.

And because they ARE DIFFERENT – they deserve to be treated with more care, more diligence, and MORE RESPECT.

Accidents happen.  But when an accident effects a pet, it is an accident on a different level than merely finding all one’s sweaters on the ground in baggage claim.

When an accident happens with a pet, that pet deserves to be searched for beginning the moment it is lost.  And if they aren’t immediately found, they deserve to be searched for by concerned experts until they are found.

Here’s my bottom line:  If a dog or cat is lost by airline mishandling the airline involved is responsible to begin intensive search IMMEDIATELY.  If the pet is not found within an hour, airport police and local experts (e.g., Missing Pet Partnership or its local equivalent) should be contacted to immediately intensify the search.  This is not a situation where an animal is just running around its neighborhood and can walk back in the front door.  The pet is in unfamiliar – and dangerous - territory.  Search efforts must be made quickly, and with extraordinary intensity.

It seems like common sense, doesn’t it?

But I guess common sense is not so common.

And unfortunately, it seems to be in especially short supply at airports.

Everyone who followed the story of Jack from its early days knows where they were exactly 6 months ago today — October 25, 2011, at around 9pm (U.S. Eastern Time). At that moment, Karen was informed by AA that Jack had fallen out of the ceiling in the Customs and Border Patrol Office at JFK Terminal 8.  He had been in the building for his whole ordeal – and had survived 61 days without substantial (and maybe any) food or water. Cats are amazing!!  Hope was truly alive again…

But with that hope came new realizations and new concerns.  Big wake-up call: Jack REALLY HAD BEEN in Terminal 8 (the AA terminal) all that time.  All 61 days.  The trail that the search dog had followed was not the right trail (no blame to the search dog or his handler… they were working under horrible conditions).  Jack had been in the building the whole time!  Was AA really looking for him??  They say yes… I have my doubts.  But only Jack knew the truth, and he wasn’t talking.

And the new concern: was Jack really alright?  As in healthy??  Cats can survive for a substantial amount of time without food, but it takes a toll on their internal organs, especially the liver (the body’s primary cleansing mechanism in all mammals).  And then there was the fact that he had been hurt in the fall from the ceiling – how serious was that??  Would he be able to heal and get back to his old frisky, funny, crazy self??

There were prayers, and love, and cards and gifts.  If this boy was to heal, the love alone – coming from every corner of the Earth – should have been enough to do it.

But it was not to be.  The liver disease was too advanced.  And his wounds were growing, not healing.  After 12 days in veterinary ICU, and an agonizing decision by Karen to let him go to the Rainbow Bridge, Jack became our angel in heaven.

We must use this anniversary, the 6 month anniversary of  hope renewed, THE FIRST OF THOSE 12 DAYS, to really make a difference.  To kick things into a higher gear.  What can we do in 12 days to make a real difference??

Since Jack crossed the Bridge, many people have been working hard to keep this from happening again.  Indeed, Jack’s spirit was clearly with Wenty, the cat lost by Alaska Airlines at Seattle-Tacoma Airport.  Alaska Airlines opened their hearts – and more importantly, their planes and their space in the airport! – for searchers from Missing Pet Partnership to look for Wenty.  Wenty was recovered in less than 72 hours (though every hour was a very looooooong hour for Wenty’s mama!).  Jack’s community sprang into action the moment they heard about this, starting a Facebook page for Wenty, sending love and light, and show a willingness to help in whatever way they could.

Clearly, the spirit is willing… it is time to take our desire for what happened to Jack to never happen again and go to the next level.  This movement requires more than a Facebook page.  Or even a Facebook page and a blog!  It is time for us to hit the streets – literally.  And the best way to do that is with coordinated effort.

And the best way for us to coordinate our efforts is through an organization.  A non-profit organization.  An organization we are calling…

WHERE IS JACK?, INC. has been created to provide a vehicle to spread the word about what happened to Jack and how to keep your pet safe if you must travel by air.  We’ve been expanding the website (check out Pets on a Plane: The Options, above) and will keep doing so.  We are also looking forward to taking our message to veterinary conferences (most airlines require a health certificate for pets to fly, so getting vets and vet techs to tell their clients about us would be sooooo awesome!).   We want to make people aware that pets are in substantial danger when they fly – and particularly in danger when they fly as checked baggage/cargo.  We also want vets and their clients to know that every pet incident is not reported on the DoT’s monthly Animal Incident Reports – because all companion animals are not considered “pets”.  We want every veterinarian and vet tech to know what we now know — and we want them to send their clients to us so they will not be “flying blind,” so to speak.  If Karen had known on August 24th what she knows now, Jack and Barry would never have gotten on that plane.

We also plan to spread our information through animal advocacy conferences like the No Kill Conference and the No More Homeless Pets Conferennce.  Even many animal advocates are not aware of the dangers pets face when they fly.  It’s time to make this common knowledge among the people who are most concerned with creating a better life for all animals!!

All this awareness is dedicated toward moving toward one goal:  a world in which animals are treated with respect and kindness when they travel.   They are not “baggage” or “cargo” – they are living, feeling creatures who should not have to even be at risk of going through the suffering that Jack went through.  In addition to educating people, we also advocate that airlines and airports must have policies and procedures in place to find animals quickly if an accident should occur.  We are working to make the airlines be more accountable – and to make the government more willing to enforce the need for all companion animals to be treated with kindness and dignity when they fly.

We want to be at the forefront of making all these good things happen – because if we don’t WHO WILL?  And we know you want all these things to happen, too.  Over the course of the next few months we will be asking for volunteers to put posters and post cards up in veterinary offices everywhere.  But first, we have to get those posters and post cards printed.  You can help with this RIGHT NOW – by becoming a member of WHERE IS JACK?, INC..  Your dollars will only go toward reimbursing expenses (like conference registrations) and creating and printing hard copy materials (like posters and post cards).  No salaries… no overhead.  Just getting the word out in the best way we know how.

We appreciate your continued interest in Jack and in the cause of making airline travel safer for pets.  Please keep us in your kind thoughts as we take the next steps on this journey… and keep this website in mind because you never know when you’ll run into someone who is planning to fly with their pet!!!  Spread the word… and tell them JACK WAS HERE!!!

Jack went missing over 7 months ago.  And I’ve been struggling with the complexities that have emerged as a result of my vow to him that no other animal would be die because he or she had flown a commercial airline.   And yesterday I received two more wake-up calls that this work MUST move forward.

In the middle of the afternoon, I got a text from Friend of Jack Eileen Pollan that a post had been put up on the page about Nahla, a Viszla who had gone missing from Delta’s cargo area at La Guardia Airport (just across the borough of Queens from where Jack had gone missing at JFK).  Knowing the FoJ community would respond with help and prayers, I immediately posted Nahla’s picture to Jack’s facebook page and asked the FoJs for search help.  And then I went to the vet with my oldest dog, Trixie.

You see, Trix has been limping off and on for about the last month.  And the limp (her right rear leg) has been getting more prominent.  I was worried she had a torn meniscus and figured it would be good to get an x-ray and have a doctor take a look.  And so we were at the vet for about an hour.  Turns out my Trixster (age 10) has arthritis.

Just as we were finishing up with the doctor, Bonnie Folz, Jack’s on-site search coordinator and missing pet finder extraordinaire, called to tell me there was a flyer to post on the Jack page and that help was needed getting the word out in the area surrounding La Guardia.  It was pretty clear that Nahla had left the airport property.

And as I got off the phone with Bonnie and paid my bill, I looked up to see one of the receptionists filling out a health certificate for a gentleman and his dog seated on the other side of the reception area. I listened for a bit – seems he was taking his dog to St. Croix, one of the U.S. Virgin Islands.  And then I looked at the dog.  The dog was too big to go under the seat.  And the dog was not young.  Not young AT ALL.

That meant this guy was flying out of Miami (temperature yesterday: 88 degrees F) with his dog in cargo – a dog who, it turned out, was 13 years old – and was not even having a vet check him over!!!  I had to ask…

“Sir, are you flying your dog out in cargo?  Are you aware of the stresses older dogs are subjected to when they fly cargo?”

He looked shocked.  ”Yes, he’s flying to the USVI… it’s only a 2 hour flight… “

OMG.

“Sir, do you know how many animals are lost, injured or killed by the airlines every year?  And do you know that older animals are particularly at risk?  Did you hear about Jack the Cat – lost by American Airlines’ negligence for 61 days, and then he died?”

“Oh my God no… you’re freaking me out!”

So then I went and sat with him and his dog (great dog, by the way – rescued from the streets in Mexico) and told him about Jack.  And even though what happened to Nahla was not Delta’s fault, I told him about Nahla, too – to remind him that flying in cargo is very stressful, and that dogs coming out of that situation might be very stressed and still not be safe.  And then I got his email address and promised to send him some information, which I did, right after I got home and posted Nahla’s flyer to Jack’s page, asking all the FoJs for help.

And then, later that night, Bonnie let me know that Nahla had been found.  Unfortunately, she was not found before she had crossed the rainbow bridge.

And I was reminded, yet again, how important it is that all of us keep Jack in mind all the time.

1. Nahla was lost because her guardian (who was an experienced handler) was trying to take her out of her crate in the open cargo area.  When Karen and I talked about what it was like to look for Jack in the baggage area right after he went missing, what she said over and over and over again was that the baggage area was LOUD – not a place a cat would want to stay.  And clearly, not a place an overstimulated, frightened dog would want to stay, either.  NO ONE (not airport personnel, and not even pet parents) should be allowed to remove an animal from his or her carrier in anything but a secure room in the airport.  And airlines must be required to provide such a room if they are going to move animals as “checked baggage” or “cargo.”
2. Most people just do not understand the stresses that a dog or cat (or any other animal for that matter) goes through when flying as cargo or checked baggage.  First and foremost, the animal is separated from his or her pet parent – the person he or she trusts for protection and love.  Secondly, conditions are loud, bumpy, and even possibly smelly (remember, dogs and cats have a much stronger sense of smell than humans do).  And thirdly, the animal will disembark from this stressful experience in what may be an extremely unfamiliar environment – an airport in an unknown city.  Unless the animal is very mellow by nature (since sedatives and flying are not a good combination), this has the potential to be a recipe for disaster unless all the humans involved are EXTREMELY careful.
3. All the vets and vet techs in the practice I take my animals to are well aware of what happened to Jack.  Several times, they have referred pet parents to me to help them prepare for travel.  But this was a new receptionist, and clearly the dog had recently been seen by a vet and just needed a health certificate.  If I hadn’t been at the right place at the right time — and spoken up! — this poor 13-year-old dog would have been put in cargo without a second thought… and definitely without his guardian understanding that at minimum, he needed to do some things to make sure this fur-kid would be safe.  BOTTOM LINE: it’s up to all of us, all the time, to keep our eyes and ears open, to be aware when people are planning to fly with their pets, to be prepared to raise awareness and help them prepare in the best way possible.

I know the Universe was speaking to me yesterday – reminding me that even thought honoring Jack’s legacy is complicated and sometimes difficult, it is absolutely necessary.  We must educate people and require that the airlines – and the government – change the way they approach pet air travel.  Jack, and now Nahla, deserve nothing less.

And I pray that Guido, the 13-year-old rescue dog I met yesterday, will have a safe passage to the USVI.  He’s moving there.  And I hope he gets to enjoy a nice long retirement on those pristine beaches.

Many of my friends in the animal rescue movement have told me they think worrying about how our pets (and all other animals) fly is nothing more than a luxury.  It’s hard not to see their point, since right here in the U.S., we still euthanize a dog or cat every 11 seconds simply because that animal is homeless.  Yes, it would seem that there are more pressing problems than getting Jack and Fluffy from Point A to Point B via safely via air.  BUT… but.  I can’t help but come back to this thought:

It’s all the same problem.

How could that be?  Clearly, creating safe and humane flight conditions does not have the same urgency that keeping an animal in a shelter ALIVE has.  Well, usually it doesn’t… except in a case like Jack’s.  Jack, of course, is now tragically gone because safe and humane conditions were not made a priority in transporting him.  And we can’t forget that he’s not the only one — at least 197 other DoT-defined “pets” have lost their lives as a result of their interaction with the airline industry since 2005. (And we have no idea how many others may have died who did not fit the very narrow DoT definition of “pet”.)

Of course, that number – 197 – is nothing more than a faint shadow of the 28 million dogs and cats that have been euthanized in the U.S. since 2005 (and that is often regarded as a conservative estimate).  To put this in perspective: imagine killing everyone who lives in the states of New York and New Jersey between 2005-2011.  That’s how many dogs and cats have been PTS during that time.

So, given the undeniable enormity of the euthanasia problem, and the relatively minor number of animals affected negatively by the airline industry over the same period, how can I possibly think these are the same problem??

And the answer to that question is simple: both the number of animals that are PTS every day and the way animals are treated by the airline industry are branches that are connected to the same tree.  And that tree is not an oak tree, nor an elm tree, nor even a palm tree.  The name of that tree is DISRESPECT FOR ANIMALS’ LIVES.

As a nation (I’m speaking of the U.S. here, but maybe you feel comfortable saying the situation is the same in your home country), we do not respect animals’ lives.  Indeed sometimes even what we think of as “animal welfare organizations” (think the Humane Society or PETA), have a  history of believing that homeless animals were better off dead.  From that perspective, the problem is that animals exist and that people are irresponsible.  Since we can’t fix human irresponsibility, the animals are better off if they don’t have to live under the conditions created by irresponsible humans.

I am left asking what has become the inevitable question in thinking about how we treat animals:  REALLY?!?

Imagine that we transfer this “animal logic” to dealing with another vulnerable group, human children.  Two irresponsible people get together, and a baby is conceived.  After the baby is born, the birth mother can’t handle the situation and drops the child into a dumpster.  Someone hears the child crying, picks it up, and takes it to a government facility.  Five days pass.  No one comes to claim the child.  The child is “put to sleep” – since no one wants the child, and the child probably isn’t going to have a very good life anyway.

I, personally, am grateful that this is not how our culture deals with “unwanted” children – because I WAS one of those children.  I do not know my birth parents, but I lived in foster care and the orphanage system for the first 10 weeks of my life, until I was released to my parents as their child.  Yes, I was adopted.  But I know there were many others in that same situation at that time who were not so lucky – especially children of color and those with disabilities.  Many of those humans lived out their childhoods in the foster care system.  For most kids, it’s not at all a good start.  And I wouldn’t really call it “respectful.” But it is a step up from not being allowed to live.

RESPECT FOR LIFE seems like a simple matter, but it isn’t.  As a nation, we disrespect animals’ lives every day by killing them for the crime of being homeless.  And as Jack’s story showed us, “respect for the dollar” is a much higher priority than “respect for life” is for the airline industry.

But are we going about trying to solve the problem in a “back-ass-wards” way??  Shouldn’t we be directing our efforts toward ending the killing, instead of ending the inhumane travel conditions??

And this is why it is crucial that we see all these issues as being the fruits of the same tree, the tree of disrespect for animal life.  If we can create a world where all animals are treated with dignity and respect on planes, that changes the tree of disrespect.  It kills one of its branches.  If plane travel is a branch where we as human beings must say “my pet, my four-legged child, this life that is allied with mine, must also be treated with dignity and care,” that creates one less place where disrespect is acceptable.  And with every place where disrespect for animals’ lives is no longer acceptable, the strength of a new tree, the tree of RESPECT FOR ALL LIFE, grows a little stronger.

Every day, I feel like Jack gave me an incredible gift — the gift of a very specific problem that has several potential reasonable solutions that would benefit animals and their guardians.  Jack catalyzed me into action, the action of cutting into this one branch of disrespect, and making air travel a safe place for the furry kids.  And when we get this fixed, we will have learned much and have weakened the tree of disrespect.  We will have taken a step in the right direction!!

Making conditions for our four-legged children safe on planes will not change the world all by itself, but it is a step in the right direction.  And we have to take every step we see as possible if we are going to live in world where all the animals get the respect and love they deserve.  The same respect and love they give us – unconditionally!!!

Doing a google search about pet travel last weekend (because it’s really just about the only thing I think about now), I ran across a website that had the following statement: “Air travel is as safe for pets as it is for people.”   And again, I was back to my new favorite question:  REALLY?!?!?  Are you KIDDING me??

From the beginning of 2005 through the end of  2010 (72 months), 122 people were killed on commercial airlines in the United States.  In three of those years (2007, 2008, and 2010), there were NO human airline fatalities.  Obviously this is very  good news!!  During the period from May 2005 through April 2011 (72 months), according to DoT Pet Incident Reports, 188 animals were killed.  THAT MEANS 50% more PETS than humans died on planes!!  AND,of course that doesn’t even really tell the whole story.  Over 100 more animals were reported lost or injured during the same period.  And even that is not the whole story… as I wrote about earlier, this only covers the very narrow class of “pets” that the DoT is willing to recognize!!

The website where I found this erroneous statement about pet safety has a relationship with IPATA – The International Pet and Animal Transportation Association.  Now, as we all know, animals transported through IPATA members are not going to be covered by DoT Pet Incident reporting.  But, maybe these folks know something we don’t know… maybe their members (professional pet shippers) are able to create some form of safety for our fur-kids that we as pet parents are not able create because we are just “amateurs.”  Maybe Jack would have been safer if Karen had used an IPATA-affiliated shipping service instead of just caring for Jack and Barry herself??  I decided to read more about what IPATA is and see what they do.

This dog probably isn't having much fun, but is it better than flying as checked baggage?

And here’s what I found: IPATA is nothing more than an association for pet shippers.  They do not maintain specific “standards” for pet shippers beyond those required in the shippers’ country of origin for licensure and insurance purposes and completion of a webinar that they provide (which they call Pet Shipping 101).  If an individual is looking to transport a pet and wants to be reassured about the safety of this process, they direct the person to their FAQs page.  And this is where things get truly bizarre.

In answer to the questions “Are cargo holds safe for pets? Is it safe to ship my pets as cargo?”, IPATA replies “An Ann Landers column and comments in subsequent editorials, pretty well covers the subject.” That seemed a little strange to me – a professional organization presents not their own viewpoint, not academic research, but AN ANN LANDERS COLUMN to answer the most basic question a pet parent might have about their service????  Very strange.  But let’s see what Ann Landers had to say about the subject.

The columns they provide begin with a letter from “Animal Lover in Memphis,” who is defending the actions of a woman who snuck her cat onto the plane, saying “I wouldn’t send a cockroach by air cargo.”  The column was titled “Airline Cargo Hold is No Place for an Animal.”  IPATA then prints the response their past-president had to the column (Ann Landers does not print this).  Then they show the Ann Landers column that was responding to the first column, headlined “Cargo Hold Is OK for Pets.” In that column, Ms. Landers prints several readers who respond to the original writer, including “Pilot in Bainbridge Island, Wash.” who says “I am a pilot for a major airline. At least one cargo hold in every plane is insulated, and the temperature and pressure controlled. In most aircraft, that cargo compartment has the same ventilating system as the passenger compartment… Most of us have pets of our own, and so we take good care of those in our charge. I’ve never had to take a pet off the airplane for drunkenness or unruly behavior, which is more than I can say for some passengers.”

Wow.  That’s really great.  Some unidentified “pilot” (who could be just an airline shill) is reassuring Ann Landers that he takes good care of the pets in his charge.  That’s great!!  Now how do I make sure this guy is piloting my plane, and not some uncaring pilot??

And more importantly, how do I get this guy to go do baggage handling so I can make sure my pet makes it onto the plane?? It’s true – Barry was fine ON THE PLANE.  Too bad Jack never made it that far.

As you can read for yourself, Ms. Landers goes on to quote several more readers who wrote in to protest the idea that animals may not be safe in cargo.  But again, we have NO IDEA who these people are, or what their motive is for taking the time to write to Ms. Landers.

But still, even if we believe all these people are just well-meaning readers, look at the date of the column: August, 2000.  Since that time, 16 U.S. airlines have filed for bankruptcy.  And the airlines have been under tremendous pressure to provide increased security because of the effects of the terrorist actions of 9/11/01.  Have these changes affected the safety of pet travel??  I would hazard a guess that maybe they have, but it would be just a guess.  It seems to me IPATA might want to take the time to make its own statement on these issues, rather than just continuing to provide the unverified – and DATED – opinions of people who write in to Ann Landers.

I called the company that owns the website that I referenced in the first paragraph, the one that said “Air travel is as safe for pets as it is for people.”  It’s a small company, and I spoke to someone there about the problems I had with what I had read, about Jack, about how any problem an animal has while in their care is not subject to any DoT reporting requirements.  She was a nice lady, and clearly an animal lover.  And she was shocked.  She said she was going to read the material on our website…but she wasn’t the person who could change the website.  She took my number and said her manager would call me after the first of the year.

I’ll be interested to see if they make changes.  I’ll report back in mid-January, after I talk to her supervisor.  All we can ask for, to continue to honor Jack, is that people have the opportunity to know the truth.  And the truth is this: unless your pet is with you at all times, pets are NOT AS SAFE AS PEOPLE when traveling by air.  In some circumstances, pet parents may have to take that risk.  But let’s not pretend the risk isn’t real.

Since the New York Times published the story about the cocaine smuggling ring that operated out of the American Airlines baggage department at JFK for almost 10 years (and check out the DEA report here), I have been angry.  Very very angry.

It’s not that I think that Jack was lost because of cocaine smugglers.  It’s not that I think that no one looked for Jack in the ceiling because there was cocaine there (indeed, if there had been cocaine in the ceiling during the period Jack was lost, I think there would have been a much higher chance he would have been found).  I don’t even think the problem is that the current baggage handlers were so busy smuggling cocaine that they wouldn’t look for a lost kitty.

Graphic by Broadcast Jones.

I’m angry because, as Adam Hartung at Forbes.com has also pointed out,  AMERICAN AIRLINES JUST DOESN’T GET IT.

American Airlines has been consistently named one of the worst airlines in the U.S., as has its subsidiary, American Eagle.  Parent Corporation AMR recently filed for bankruptcy, and after  2 months of dealing with AA employees in various capacities, it is clear that these folks are beaten down and absolutely dejected.  The fact that AA’s people are overwhelmed and demoralized is (one reason) why a cocaine smuggling ring could go undetected AT A MAJOR AIRPORT for so long.

During the search for Jack, one of the things AA stressed repeatedly is that no outside searchers could go into the baggage area because of security concerns.  Fair enough, I thought at the time – the 3rd weekend that Jack was lost was the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and tensions were understandably high.  And this was New York City, after all.

BUT.  But but but… before, during and after the 9/11 tragedy the smugglers and their cohorts had been running their operation our of JFK airport!!!  Despite the “heightened security” and all the other measures that passengers have had to endure for the last 10 years, nothing substantial changed for the smugglers.  Increased security had NO IMPACT on a group of people’s ability to SMUGGLE COCAINE?? REALLY????

But, in AA’s mind, it would seem it is not the baggage handlers that are the problem.  Clearly, the fact that the baggage handlers got caught is a problem.  But for AA – IT IS THE CUSTOMERS THAT ARE REALLY THE PROBLEM.  And especially problematic is the fact that customers think it is reasonable to have their things — and especially  their animals! - returned to them in the same condition as they were in when travel began.  From AA’s perspective, that seems to be too much to ask.  Indeed, this disregard for passengers and their belongings was (is?) a part of AA’s culture at JFK: according to the Times, “[Baggage handlers] stowed drugs in secret panels inside planes; stole laptops, lobsters and fine clothing flown as freight; and rifled through passengers’ belongings for perfume, liquor and electronics.‘Everybody did it.’ That’s a line that a lot of the witnesses said…”

In my mind, this constitutes MAJOR misconduct among baggage handlers over a 10 year period.  From AA’s perspective, clearly this was not really a big issue.  If this had cost AA money, it would have been fixed.  But because passengers have almost no recourse when checked baggage or cargo is LOST, stolen, or damaged, this really isn’t a problem AA saw as a priority.

And Jack was part of the “checked baggage or cargo that was lost, stolen or damaged.”  After 3 days, it was clear AA wasn’t going to look for him.  We told them we would find others who would search… but that still wasn’t enough.  AA fed us the line about “security.”  In their eyes, a bunch of “crazy cat ladies” in their 40s and 50s had the potential to constitute a “terrorist threat.”

And now this cocaine smuggling news breaks.  And all becomes clearer: the real problem was not “security.”  The problem was that AA didn’t want to be bothered.  That was the message that was sent from Dallas-Ft. Worth to everyone in the organization.  And it is the message the corporate bigwigs had sent down long before that.  If it wasn’t, the cocaine smugglers wouldn’t have gotten away with their business for almost 10 years.  And so a beautiful boy named Jack remained lost for 61 days and eventually died from the effects of this ordeal.

IT DIDN’T HAVE TO BE THAT WAY.  Wenty went missing and Alaska Airlines promised to do whatever it would take to find him – they grounded a plane to search it and even offered to disassemble a luggage conveyor.  They notified ALL the employees at SeaTac quickly, and a baggage handler for United – quite a distance away from Alaska Airlines terminal – found Wenty and she was returned to her family within 100 hours.

Of course, it took 66 hours for AA to just call Karen about the situation.

What to do??

First off, don’t fly American Airlines.  Whether or not you’re flying with pets, expensive jewelry and perfume, or with nothing at all – just don’t give them your money.  Protest their negligent, disrespectful corporate philosophy by taking your money somewhere else.

Secondly, tell everyone you know.  Tell them about Jack, tell them about the cocaine smuggling ring, tell them about the fact that pets aren’t safe when they travel in checked baggage or cargo with any airline.  Talk about what has happened to airline travel and its impact on us as people and on our pets.

Third, (if you’re in the U.S.), contact your Senators and your member of the House of Representatives.  Tell them that deregulation of the airlines should not mean that passengers have no recourse when their baggage – and especially when their pets!! – are not treated respectfully.  The airline business has a variety of regulations it must adhere to that insure our safety: why isn’t the safety of our pets (and our stuff) on the priority list as well?!?

Finally: hang tight with us here and on the Facebook page.  We are creating pages that will be posted SOON with information about how to keep pets safe when you travel, and what options are available when you have to travel by air and your fur-kids simply won’t fit under the seat.

My last word: OY. Nothing else even begins to cover how much this upsets me.  Well, nothing else that would have a G-rating.

I’ve spent the last few days and weeks delving deeper into the tragedies BEHIND the tragedy of what happened to Jack:

• the tragedies of other animals being lost and killed while in the airlines’ care;
• the tragedy of our government’s lack of interest in protecting creatures who are traveling by air;
• the tragedy that many commercial businesses will say ANYTHING to make money;
• and finally, the tragedy that many pet owners don’t even know that their pets are in danger when they fly.

Small groups of concerned Friends of Jack (FoJs) have assembled in various forums to discuss the legacy of Jack: what it’s going to take to make sure no other pet is lost by an airline.  But this is a complex goal that involves at least three separate and distinct categories of players:

• animal guardians;
• the airlines; and
• the U.S. government.

Each of these groups must participate in certain ways if a traveling animal is to be safe.

ANIMAL GUARDIANS

The first line of defense against an animal being lost during transportation is that animal’s guardians.  Those guardians include:

• pet parents (a person who has agreed to be the caretaker of a companion animal for its lifetime);
• rescue groups (people/organizations who agree to take care of an animal until it can be placed with a pet parent);
• breeders (anyone who has overseen the conception and birth of an animal and who seeks to sell it to a pet parent);
• anyone else who has agreed to be responsible for an animal’s food and shelter for a specific period of time.

Many pet parents and other responsible parties who often either travel with pets or who have pets traveling alone (e.g., rescue groups who arrange transport of pets to their pet parents in other cities) are aware of the hazards of air travel and take precautions to insure the safety of the animal.  It is relatively rare (though not unheard of – e.g., Vivi) that pet parents who allow their dogs to participate in many dog shows experience difficulty with air travel.  Like all experienced travelers, these pet parents know the “ins and outs” and know how to keep their furry kids safe.

There are is one HUGE challenge at this level:

Educating Animal Guardians Who Do Not Travel Regularly (or ever) With Their Pet: Jack’s mom, Karen, fell into this group.  She did what she knew how to do: she consulted with her vet and with the airline regulations.  She even went a step further and consulted with a friend who was an airline flight attendant.  But it never occurred to her to do further research on what else she might need to do to keep Jack safe – because she didn’t know that airlines do not place keeping pets safe as a high priority.  She did not know that airlines really do consider pets to be no different from other forms of checked baggage or cargo.  We need to educate pet parents about the hazards of pet travel when a pet must go as checked baggage or cargo (including information about pet carriers!), providing information about other travel options, and precautions to take if being separated from your pet is unavoidable.

THE AIRLINES

Each airline has its own specific rules for pet travel.  Some, like Southwest and Jet Blue, only allow pets to travel under the seat.  This is fine, of course, unless you wish to travel with a pet who does not fit under the seat (I’ll be writing a blog post on non-baggage travel options for these pets soon).  This means your precious fur-baby is now in the care of the airlines for the duration of your travel.  In a reasonable world, what should the airlines be doing to insure your pet’s safety as you go from Point A to Point B?

1. Every airline should have its own secure area where animals wait to be placed on the plane.  The person paying the pet’s way should be allowed to put the animal in that area.  That area then should be viewable by all pet guardians via webcam.
2. Only trained, concerned, pet-friendly handlers should be allowed to handle pets.  As in the story of Lynn Jones,  concerned, educated baggage handlers can save lives.  Ideally, these folks should be paid a little bit more!!
3. Because accidents WILL happen, airlines must have a response plan in place.  Just as on-board airline staff are prepared for emergencies, so too must workers in the cargo and baggage areas be prepared for the worst.  Airlines must drill their employees on what to do if a dog or cat does escape from its crate, and every airlines should have a search team (including search dog) on retainer and ready to respond within 2 hours of a pet going missing on airport grounds.  The closest we have seen to this yet was the case of Wenty – and Alaska Airlines deserves kudos for their cooperation.  Airlines must emulate – and even improve on! – this response.

THE U.S. GOVERNMENT

Finally, because the airline industry is HIGHLY  regulated (especially in the wake of 9/11), the government must also be willing to stand up to commercial interests and stand for the appropriate care of all animals who are being transported by air.  There are two significant initiatives that could make air travel for animals much safer:

1. Treat ALL Traveling Animals with Dignity, Respect, and ACCOUNTABILITY: Right now, in the U.S., animals that are not traveling with their pet parent are not accounted for on the monthly, publicly available, Department of Transportation Pet Incident Reports.  As I wrote in my last blog post, the definition of “animal” only includes those animals being returned to their parent or guardian.  Animals traveling to their new homes or to pet stores are not counted.  This means literally hundreds of thousands (and perhaps millions) of dogs and cats are flying each year and, should something happen to any of them, there only accountability is the airline’s “liability” to the “shipper” – usually about $150 per animal.  Animals are allowed to be lost, injured, suffer and even die — and the U.S. public has no way to find out about how often this happens. And the “guardians” of many of these animals don’t want anyone to know what has happened. This further reinforces the airlines’ stance that  pets are no different from other forms of checked baggage or cargo.   All animals traveling as cargo or checked baggage need to be accounted for by the DoT and the USDA.
2. Impose SERIOUS fines on airlines that do not appropriately care for animals in transit: what if American Airlines had to pay a fee for every day Jack had been lost – let’s say a fine of $1,000 per day.  This would force the airlines to respond in one of three ways:

• Be much more careful in the transport of animals;
• Raise the price of shipping animals to insure that these costs would be covered  (which would force people to find other, safer ways to travel with their pets); and/or
• Get out of the animal shipping business.

I actually could live with any of those outcomes.

So, to anyone that is reading this, I think this covers many of the bases of what it’s going to take to make NEVER AGAIN  a reality.  What do you think???

From the day we started the Facebook page, Karen and I were both clear that we only had 2 objectives:

1. Find Jack.
2. Make sure this never happens again.

As much as we didn’t like the final outcome on #1, it was accomplished.  Now, it’s time to begin the serious and difficult work that the second part of this demands…

The first question I wanted more information about was “How often, exactly, are pets killed, injured or lost when they are placed in cargo?”

Section 710 of the AIR-21 Act (P.L. 106-81) requires the following:

• In General. — An air carrier that provides scheduled passenger air transportation shall submit monthly to the Secretary [of Transportation] a report on any incidents involving the loss, injury, or death of an animal (as defined by the Secretary of Transportation) during air transport provided by the air carrier.

As most of you reading this already know, there have been incidents with pets in cargo since Jack’s loss.  For example, we are aware of a cat that was lost and then found dead at JFK during the time of the search for Jack, but the owner was traveling on Air France, and so there was no official report of this incident.  Air carriers that are not based in the U.S. do not fall under the jurisdiction of the Department of Transportation, so if an incident happens with an animal who will be traveling on an international carrier – even if that incident happens completely in the U.S. – no incident report needs to be filed.

And then there is the definition of “animal:  the law states that the term “animal” will be defined by the Secretary of Transportation.  In a letter to Senator Robert Menendez, one of the original sponsors of the AIR-21 law (see his original letter here), then-DOT General Counsel D.J. Gribbin states that ”the air transport of an animal includes the entire period during which an animal is in the custody of an air carrier until the animal is returned to the owner or guardian.  We therefore concluded that Congress intended the word “animal to cover pets being transported by their owners” (italics in original).

This means that, for those of us who are concerned with knowing exactly how many animals are killed, injured, or lost while flying cargo every year, the DOT report only tells us about a limited number of cases.  Think about just two of the infinite number of circumstances that would render report by the air carrier unnecessary:

• Animal flying from rescue group to new home because no other transportation option is available… animal is injured, lost or dies in cargo, but because animal is not being returned to its owner, the airline is not required to report.
• Pet parent dies, and his or her animals are being flown to another family member who has agreed to take care of them… animal is injured, lost or dies in cargo, but because animal is not being returned to its owner, the airline is not required to report.

But the most important reason the DOT standard for reporting is not only flawed, but actively hides the enormous dangers faced by pets in cargo is stated in the same letter by then-General Counsel Gribbin: “We have no data on the loss, injury, or death of animals during commercial shipments.  However, we understand that air carriers carry large numbers of animals, including livestock, zoo animals, and pets … in such shipments.”  Even though LARGE NUMBERS of cognizant beings are transported as luggage on commercial airlines, it’s not their problem!!

What might be contained in a “commercial shipment of animals”?  Cows, pigs, bears, ferrets, and, of course, dogs… dogs that are being sent from their place of birth (e.g., a “commercial breeder” aka puppy mill) to puppy stores, for example.  The estimates on the number of just dogs (without even taking into consideration the other animals) shipped like this annually ranges from 3-8 million every year.  In short, this means a substantial amount of money changes hands to get animals from one location to another.  Animals that are not seen as living, conscious beings – but as mere commercial entities.  Like furniture.

But as General Counsel for the DOT,  Gribbin recognizes that that is NOT HIS PROBLEM, and he refers the rest of Senator Menendez’s questions to the USDA, specifically, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS).  The acting administrator of APHIS at that time, Kevin Shea, flatly states that THEY DO NOT HAVE ANY ACCURATE DATA ON THE NUMBER OF COMMERCIAL SHIPMENTS OF ANIMALS, nor, of course, on the number of deaths, injuries or losses of these animals.

So the DOT tells us that they know air carriers are carrying “large numbers of animals” that aren’t under their regulatory purview… and the USDA tells us they have no idea what these “large numbers” of animals are, or what is happening to them.  Since nobody seems to give a damn and there is obviously no recourse beyond exchange of money for “liability”, we can only guess what is actually happening to those animals.  And my guess is, it isn’t something that we as humans should be proud of.

So when you read the “Pet Incident Report” that the DOT files every month, just remember, IT IS A VERY SMALL PART of the story of animals traveling by air.  As Jack taught us, even that part of the story is not pretty if anything goes wrong.  I shudder to imagine what else is happening beyond the “incident reports.”