Lawrence Humane Society heads to Greensburg to help animals

Judy Smith hugs her cat, Pawsh, after finding her Tuesday under her destroyed home in Greensburg. Smith's home was destroyed along with most of the rest of the community of 1,400 from Friday's tornado.

KU rescue support unit helps out

A heavy rescue support unit that belongs to Kansas University will make its way down to Greensburg to assist with search and rescue efforts there.

Rick Deibert of the KU Continued Education Fire and Safety Rescue Training Institute will deliver the vehicle today to the small south-central Kansas town that was mostly destroyed by a tornado on Friday.

The support unit, which is a business-class truck with technical rescue equipment, was requested by an incident commander in Greensburg, where nine people died from the powerful tornado.

Just talking about the homeless animals in Greensburg will move Midge Grinstead to tears.

Ask her to describe the situation she’s seeing and the work she’s doing there, and she’s practically speechless. She can find only one word to describe the destruction she sees around her.

“Unbelievable,” she says, over and over again.

Grinstead, executive director of the Lawrence Humane Society, and other Lawrence residents set out for Greensburg to help care for pets and farm animals that were lost or left behind in the aftermath of Friday’s tornado that demolished 95 percent of the small town.

At the request of the state, Grinstead and others from the humane society traveled to Greensburg with kennels, bowls, litter boxes, sanitizer and other supplies needed to rescue and care for family pets and livestock.

Already, she said as she drove through the destroyed town, she’s witnessed triumph and tragedy as people look for their pets.

“I don’t know what’s worse – when they find them and are so upset, or when they don’t find them and are so upset,” she said. “We just had a family come in looking for a dog. He had been logged in, but we couldn’t find him.”

Grinstead said she thought the dog was among the first round of animals moved to a shelter in Dodge City.

More than 50 people are working to care for hundreds of pets rescued from the rubble.

The Kansas Animal Health Department also has a crew helping in the area. Debra Duncan, director of the department’s animal facility inspection program, said that after talking to the animal shelter in Pratt, she organized several people to help with organization and care.

“It’s definitely a group effort,” she said.

She said Dodge City Animal Control was the first organization on the scene within six hours. Right now, the animal health department is preparing to move the animals from a variety of temporary locations, including a Kansas Department of Transportation maintenance facility, to a building at the fairgrounds in Dodge City that has running water.

“Hopefully that’ll be easier, having them all in one place,” Duncan said. Dodge City is about 40 minutes from Greensburg, she said.

Right now, Duncan said the responders in the area have all the supplies they need to care for the animals, but she said that donations to the local humane society would likely help replenish local supplies that are being used to care for animals in Greensburg.

Grinstead described one scene during which a family was able to take comfort in finding its missing animals.

“A family came in that has lost everything,” she said. “They were reunited with their cat and dog. Everyone was crying. It just worked out really well.”