- October 15, 2024
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A dog statue overlooks the flooded grounds at the Halifax Humane Society. Courtesy photo
Robert Reynolds cuddled up at the Flagler Humane Society during the storm with Odin the Great Dane and Pip the poodle Wednesday night, Oct. 9. Courtesy photo
All five dog exercise yards and the two dog parks at the Halifax Humane Society were still underwater Tuesday, Oct. 15. Courtesy photo
All five dog exercise yards and two dog parks at Halifax Humane Society were still underwater Tuesday, Oct. 15. Courtesy photo
The Rymfire Elementary School gym was ready to shelter pets during the storm. Courtesy photo
The grounds at Halifax Human Society were still flooded on Tuesday, Oct. 15. Courtesy photo
The Halifax Humane Society in Daytona Beach received an influx of stray pets before Hurricane Milton battered the state, but the community stepped up, Humane Society CEO Sean Hawkins said in an email.
“There was speculation that pets were being abandoned ahead of families evacuating,” Hawkins said. “Luckily for the Halifax Humane Society, the community really stepped up in a big way. We offered fee-waived adoptions for every pet in the shelter before the hurricane and we moved 64 animals into new adoptive homes or foster homes over a two-day period.”
The pets and the structures at both the Halifax and Flagler humane societies made it through the storm without any problems, Hawkins and Flagler Humane Society Executive Director Amy Carotenuto said. But Halifax’s grounds were devastated by flooding.
On Tuesday, Oct. 15, five days after the storm went out to sea, all five dog exercise yards and the two dog parks at the shelter were still underwater, Hawkins said.
The Flagler Humane Society lost power Wednesday night, Oct. 9, but it was able to use a generator that it purchased two years ago through a FEMA grant. Power came back on late Thursday.
“The generator took me years to get,” said Carotenuto, who applied for the grant after Hurricane Irma in 2017.
“The shelter was high and dry,” during the storm, Carotenuto said.
All of the pets, including a goat, were brought inside. The goat tore up a couple of things and was happy to get back outside on Friday, she said.
For the most part, because of the absence of thunder, the animals stayed calm, Carotenuto said. Animal Care and Placement Manager Kyndra Mott spent the night and traded out dogs to sleep with.
She ended up with a Great Dane. She had a poodle, several dogs. She was letting them take turns. Anyone who was scared got to hang out longer.
— AMY CAROTENUTO, Flagler Humane Society executive director
“She ended up with a Great Dane. She had a poodle, several dogs. She was letting them take turns. Anyone who was scared got to hang out longer. But really they weren’t nervous,” Carotenuto said.
At Halifax, Hawkins stayed on site with six animal care team members for 48 hours.
“The dogs all had warm beds and blankets to snuggle in. The cats all had hiding dens and towels to nest and hide,” he said. “We made rounds every hour through the night. We had no issues with animal care through the storm.”
The Flagler Humane Society also takes care of the pets that evacuees bring to the emergency shelter at Rymfire Elementary School. The Rymfire shelter housed 12 cats, 11 dogs and one parakeet, Carotenuto said.
Faith, the parakeet, was a favorite of the Flagler Schools staff, which provided cots and food for the people in the shelter. Flagler Schools Superintendent LaShakia Moore said a couple of guests at the shelter complimented the school district on its “five-star” accommodations.
Thanks to an 18-year-old law — the PETS Act (Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act of 2006) — pets are well treated at shelters too. The law, which passed in response to Hurricane Katrina the previous year, requires states to include pets and service animals in their emergency preparedness plans to receive federal funding.
“I remember when Red Cross shelters would turn animals away and leave them shut in homes for two or three days, which is crazy,” Carotenuto said. “If it’s not safe for you, it’s not safe for your pets.”
While the dogs and cats and goat and parakeet were safe at the Flagler Humane Society and Rymfire shelter, in the previous years, the Humane Society had to evacuate the animals.
During the 1998 fires, Carotenuto said, all of Flagler County was evacuated.
“We had to go to Gainesville,” Carotenuto said. “The Gainesville Animal Control Facility accepted us. In (the hurricanes of 2004), we had to go to the Flagler County Fairgrounds into metal buildings, which wasn’t the best situation, but at least we were far west.”
