Chantal Rose, a canine search specialist, has been following her dogs into disaster areas and on wilderness searches for 14 years. After every high-profile mission, a surge of inspired volunteers “comes out of the woodwork,” she says.

But phone lines have been eerily quiet since the devastation in Haiti.

“With 9-11, with Katrina, there was a big response,” says Rose, of Santa Cruz, Calif. She’s the canine coordinator for a Federal Emergency Management Agency-certified California Task Force team, one of 28 crews nationally that FEMA enlists for help in disasters. She says she’s seen virtually no interest since the Haiti earthquake, despite the massive media attention.

Rose has an idea about why people aren’t taking the leap: the economy. No matter how much intelligence or skill a dog exhibits for search-and-rescue work, the training is intensive. Dogs must learn to near perfection a new set of behaviors and develop an obsessive drive while on a scent. Owners turned handlers must master an understanding of those behaviors plus new communications with the dog, while learning survival and search skills. Before a handler realizes the dream of saving a life or tracking down a missing person, he or she will commit lots of time and lots of money.

Those are two commodities that aren’t easy to come by in this economy. Several handlers say the effects won’t be felt for a couple of years, when there could be fewer lifesaving dogs ready for the call.

“It’s not a paying job. It’s all volunteer,” says Rose, describing her efforts to train new dogs and their handlers through the nonprofit Monterey Bay Search Dogs. She says she receives what she describes as a small stipend from FEMA for her work as the canine coordinator but says it doesn’t even cover gas for the frequent 60-mile trips to the training facilities.

“It’s not for the well intended. it’s a lifestyle change,” says officer Chris Boyer, of the California Emergency Management Agency Law Enforcement Division, agreeing that the economy has deterred potential volunteers. “A lot of people are loath to take time off. They don’t want to look like the weak link at work.”

A search-and-rescue situation can occur at any time, he says, and teams have to jump into action.

As the leader of that agency’s search-and-rescue canine program, Boyer is happy to report that the roster of certified dogs swelled by 49 in 2009, a 35 percent increase over the previous year. But some of those dogs had been in training for two years before the recession started. Other dogs had already been in some sort of service, often for local agencies, but not at the state level.

For those who decide to volunteer themselves and their best friends, they quickly find out how much time and money are required.

Dr. Michael Weiss, a neonatologist and researcher at the University of Florida, wanted to take up search and rescue and spent $2,000 on Thor, his imported Dutch shepherd. European-bred dogs have an excellent reputation when it comes to search and rescue, in part because of their drive. Weiss refers to Thor as his Ferrari.

Having the finest set of paws money can buy has led to memorable moments. Weiss, who’s now also working with a team of dogs on scent detection of melanoma, remembers a “call-out” a few years ago when a 67-year-old man left a wedding reception and disappeared for 18 hours. It was nearly 100 degrees, the “worst scent conditions available.” Several other dogs had passed an empty building without picking up the scent, but Thor clamped on to it and tracked the man down, saving his life. “You train your whole career for and hope for that kind of find,” says Weiss.

Some handlers never get that kind of moment, however, and drop out after growing impatient.

The biggest thing that disappoints people is that they don’t get the level of commitment, says Florida handler Kathy Johnston, the deputy director of Search and Rescue of Central Florida. “You train and train. It may be months before you get a call-out,” and you might never make that fantasized find.

Mary Jane Boyd, the training coordinator for K-9 Search and Rescue of Texas, in Houston, reeled off a list of the skills and certifications that handlers must satisfy: crime-scene awareness, canine first aid, radio communications, swift-water awareness, plus a handful of incident-training certifications established by FEMA. She says the handler’s training is far more extensive than the dog’s.

Teresa MacPherson, canine search specialist, and her dog Banks rest behind the American embassy in Haiti after a day of search and rescue among the destruction on Jan. 21, 2010. (Photo courtesy of Ron Sanders)

Once the training is complete, it can be difficult to establish the flexibility in one’s career to meet all the demands search and rescue requires. Teresa MacPherson, of Catlett, Va., spent 16 days away from work when the U.S. Agency for International Development sent her FEMA task force to Haiti. MacPherson’s team is one of the few certified for international deployment. “I’ve never seen anything like it before, and I’m sure I won’t again,” she says about Haiti, pointing out that she worked the Oklahoma City bombing and Hurricane Katrina.

FEMA pays for all transportation to the disaster site. It also pays an hourly wage; the suggested national rate is $28.73 per hour. MacPherson says she feels lucky that she works for her family’s business, a real estate title company. She can get away to answer a major assignment. “Search and rescue isn’t scheduled. Jobs are pretty precious right now,” says MacPherson.

Howard Paul, spokesman for the National Association for Search and Rescue, says he thinks there’s another dynamic at play. “We’re seeing generational changes in search and rescue,” he says. “The mind-set of the culture in the generation coming along isn’t as quick to volunteer.”

Paul called search and rescue a “mutual aid” discipline. “When an agency is conducting an operation, they call out for additional resources,” he says, and those resources come, from far away if need be. But Howard points out that time is crucial in search and rescue. If there aren’t enough teams near an emergency and dogs and handlers from further abroad have to respond, that creates a bigger search area and reduces the chance of success. Time becomes an enemy.

Like all search-and-rescue volunteers, Boyd hopes that the future will bring increased interest and more commitment: “Most people don’t think about us until they need us.”