Alberta pup goes to Ukraine to help with the war effort by detecting explosives

An Alberta canine puts his nose to good use.

Torch is a 3-year-old Belgian Malinois and a professionally trained explosives detection dog. In the fall, he will go to Ukraine to locate landmines and unexploded ordnance — explosives that have not detonated or function as intended — in the conflict zone.

Torch was trained by Alberta K9, a company in Gull Lake, Alta., that specializes in preparing dogs for police, personal protection, and private security roles.

The dog’s overseas trip is being sponsored by an Edmonton-based charity, Firefighter Aid Ukraine. A dog with Torch’s specialized skills would normally be valued at $25,000. But Alberta K9 lends Torch to charity for free.

“We just wanted to find a meaningful way to help,” said Matt LaPointe, co-owner of Alberta K9.

A perfect fit for a ‘focused’ dog

Torch is a late bloomer and was born in 2019. One of his littermates, Marshall, started working at Edmonton Fire Rescue Services in 2021 as a flammable liquid detection dog.

LaPointe said he and Kelsey LaPointe, his wife and co-owner, knew they had a great dog in the kennel, but were trying to match Torch’s personality.

“He’s a very, very intensely focused dog,” he said. “And we thought, with everything going on in Ukraine, why not train him in explosives detection.”

LISTEN | An Alberta dog goes to Ukraine to help save lives

With a new career plan, LaPointe got in touch with Firefighter Aid Ukraine, which also trains Ukrainian first responders and collects donations for firefighters.

Project director Kevin Royle said Torch is one of the more unique donations they’ve sent overseas.

“We shipped really high-end equipment like X-ray machines and anesthesiologists,” he said. “But to be able to ship something like that, that’s so specialized… It’s pretty incredible.”

A hyper-specialized sniffing machine

Dogs are trained to detect explosives through scent association. When they find a certain scent, they appropriately alert their handler, leading to a reward. For landmine detection, the smell is buried deep underground, and depending on the job – and the workplace – training can look a little different.

“There’s a little bit of fine-tuning,” LaPointe said. For example, Torch was trained in both English and hand commands so he could work silently.

Torch also gets toys instead of food when he finds the smell of live explosives, and he has learned to retreat from the place to prevent the found device from activating.

Does a damn good job

Torch will go to Ukraine with a handler in September. Firefighter Aid Ukraine is raising about $80,000 to get Torch and the team to Kiev.

Ukraine has its own working dogs, but the program was based on the country’s pre-war needs. The number of landmines and unexploded bombs since the start of the conflict in 2022 is beyond what they can handle.

“This dog is going to help solve a lot of problems,” said Royle. “It affects their economy, security and of course public safety. And it’s estimated that for every year of conflict you’re looking at 10 years of mine clearance.”

Torch will have an immediate impact, he said.

A heritage on four legs

More than a hundred specially trained dogs have been shipped around the world by Alberta K9, and Torch will be the first to go beyond North America.

The company already supplies sniffer dogs for narcotics, firearms, mold and bed bugs. They also support Indigenous communities by providing detection corners for managing drug and alcohol crises.

LaPointe, who is Métis, says the ability to give back to communities through his dogs makes all the difference.

“We love being able to make a difference wherever we can,” he said. “Dogs are a very underutilized resource.”