Page 10 - Chiron Spring 2020

10 CHIRON CALLING
A Labs Day Out
Pte Tatters 102 SQN
As always 102 Sqn AES section has been extremely busy so here are a few of the more prestigious and exciting training opportunities that we have had.
Silverstone. On the 18/10/19 Cpl Wood, Cpl Duff and I were very fortunate to search Silverstone Race track arena, and although the weather was against us it did not dampen our day. Honest, it really didn’t; Cpl Duff managed to sweet talk the staff so we could search indoors! We were lucky enough to search all the conference rooms and the galleries leading on to the tracks. Once the weather had eased off a little, we were allowed to search the outdoor stands next to the tracks, with strict instruction that we do NOT go on the race track itself. Although MWD Captain (Duffy’s dog!) could not help himself and he certainly wasn’t a Porsche.
Westfield. On 21/11/19 the section struck gold with another great venue; Westfield shopping centre, London. Another early start for the team. This time we were joined by Pte Ferrari and Pte Hoyland. When we arrived at the shopping centre, we were met by the centres dog unit who showed us our areas of work. Before searching the first area we all decided to have a nosey and it immediately hit us that the shopping centre was packed, and that there was a lot of open food stands and in particular a very expensive butcher! All the dogs did really well maintaining their focus, if anything the handlers where more distracted by the food, even me - which I don’t mind admitting! However, MWD
Labs Day out – team photo
Captain could not help himself and almost got his paws on a bag of cookies but Duffy was quick on his toes and managed to
MWD Captain could not help himself and almost got his paws on a bag of cookies but Duffy was quick on his toes and managed to stop the little rascal before he had the lot!
stop the little rascal before he had the lot! It must have had something to do with the price of them!
We managed to search a lot of the shopping centre and as predicted we attracted a lot of attention and that’s not because of how good looking the handlers were, it must have been because of all the Labs! But being professional as always, we cracked on with the task at hand. The whole day from start to finish was a success and all the dogs and handlers worked perfectly, especially considering all the distractions a busy shopping centre can provide!
Peterborough Cathedral. Lastly and more recently, thanks to Lt Mosey, we were able to search Peterborough Cathedral. LCpl Clausen, Pte Bell and Pte Johnson were able to join us this time. With the section complete and all dogs raring to go, Cpl Duff and Cpl Wood set up the search whilst the rest of the section did what we do best, drink Costa’s and eat McDonalds breakfasts. Just like Labs the section is also a bunch of foodies! Again, another cold wet day but that did not affect the training. Once again, we had the chance to get eyes on the area and the section came up with an order of search. The dog teams once again all did really well, not even God could have found their performances wanting, and surprisingly even MWD Captain behaved! Before the end of the day the guys who work on keeping the Cathedral grounds absolutely amazing could not resist getting a team photo of the section, which was very quickly shared on Instagram and liked by many, again this must have had something to do with the dogs being lookers despite LCpl Ferrari believing it was him...
So that’s just three of the many great venues 102 SQN have been to explore with our dogs and in doing so, meeting a lot of wonderful and kind people who took no end of joy seeing our little four-legged companions sniffing around. I would like to thank all the guys at Silverstone, Westfield shopping centre and Peterborough Cathedral who let us and the hounds work on improving our skills and drills and looking after us whilst using your venues - we hope to see you soon in the future.
Stadium dogs