April 13 (UPI) — Airport workers in Canada this week fatally shot a rescue dog that escaped from a plane and ran onto the tarmac.
On Monday afternoon, Greta, a 2-year-old labrador mix, was being flown to a foster home in Winnipeg under the care of the Manitoba Mutts, a dog rescue organization. When the plane landed and airport workers opened the carriage door, Greta jumped out after apparently chewing through a plastic portion of her kennel.
Greta then ran on the tarmac, causing one plane to avert its landing. Airport workers were unable to catch her and, when she was in the pathway of another plane, airport workers shot her to get her out of the way.
“It was a tough day for everyone,” said Tyler MacAfee, the Winnipeg Airports Authority’s director of corporate communications, according to the CBC. “It’s certainly not the outcome anyone wants to see, and it’s a really tough decision for someone to make to use force in that way on an animal…But at the same time it’s that balance of aviation safety.”
In a statement, Manitoba Mutts said airport workers were not to blame for the shooting.
“We truly believe that all parties involved did the best they could with the training and resources available to them and no one person or group is to blame,” the organization said.
It added: “We are incredibly devastated that this was the outcome for Greta and that she never got to live the life we wanted for her. In over seven years of our operation, and transporting hundreds of dogs in the same manner, this is the first instance of this kind and we are going to work to ensure it’s the last.”
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