Phenix 1500, it’s not just a firefighting helmet, it’s a dog!

This blog is about Humane Emergency Animal Rescue’s (HEAR) icon. Or should I say, my pick for the organizations icon and a personal one to me. This takes us back to the beginning of HEAR. I had received verification from the state of Florida that HEAR was officially a legal nonprofit. Wow what a feeling it was to have received those documents. It was exciting.

The next morning I drove out of the apartment complex where I was living to get some fast food. Since Biscayne boulevard was always so difficult to get across I decided to go the back way. I stopped at the stop sign at the end of the block. While looking for traffic I noticed a floppy eared German Shepard mutt sitting next to the stop sign. He looked pretty much like the image at the top of this post except his left front leg had a tar roofing shingle attached like a splint.

Wow, I thought. How appropriate. Here’s an injured dog sitting at a stop sign down the street from my apartment less than twenty-four hours after HEAR became official. I felt like the universe was saying, put up or shut up, what are you going to do now? I rolled down the passenger window and asked the dog if it needed a ride. It looked at me and started wagging it’s tail. Using a trick I’d learned from an experienced animal control officer, I opened the passenger door, called out “come on, let’s go for a ride”.

Surprisingly the dog limped over to the truck. I got out and helped him into the passenger seat where I was able to see it was an intact male. We went for a fast food breakfast where the dog quickly ate a sandwich and hash browns. Next stop was my apartment where I checked him for other injuries and replaced the splint with a more appropriate one. Next was a trip to the veterinarian.

Dr. Beug ordered blood work, deworming and x-rays. Blood work turned out ok, deworming was successful, and he was healing from a fracture on the lower left front leg. My intensions were to get him patched up then send him to a breed specific organization or animal shelter for adoption.

I thought while convalescing him maybe I’d try to train him. I had seen some amazing videos of dogs herding sheep by whistle commands in the United Kingdom. Read a book about dog behavior that changed the way I viewed dogs. After being exposed to the sheep herders and dog behavior it inspired me to try to train the dog before it would be adopted making it much more desirable, adoptable.

While trying to teach him verbal commands I noticed he was particularly watching my hands as I spoke. The way we use our hands and arms to illustrate our speech. This gave me the idea to stop using my hands while talking. Instead I would also give commands with my hands along with the verbal commands. My intension was to be able to give a command with only my hand. To my surprise it worked. He seemed to respond to the hand commands better than the verbal.

He learned, sit, lay, stay, find it, come, heel and more. Both verbal and hand signals. By about the third week of his healing and training he had started to grow on me. His heel response from a distance would be to run toward me, jump up and spin around landing inches from my left leg. Then look up at me as if to say “like that?” with his what I’d describe as a cartoon face. Don’t make me like you I warned him or he’d be stuck with me for his whole life.

As much as I tried to deny it I had become attached to him. He had been by my side at that point for over a month. Every single day while I was working on the standard operating procedures manual for HEAR he would be laying on my feet or curled up next to my leg. He had responded to the training so well, knew every command. Verbal or hand signal. I knew I had found a dog that could work with me out on rescue calls and wouldn’t be a flight risk or not follow commands when it vitally necessary to his or our safety.

His goofy personality matched mine perfectly. At that point I was calling him “Mutt”. Didn’t want to name him because I thought he’d be going somewhere else to live. After I decided to keep him I had to name him. Growing up around the military I learned everything had a name and model number. Being the simple minded person I am my bright idea for a name was Phenix 1500.

The name Phenix 1500 came from a model of firefighting helmet that I came to prefer over the years. It fit what I needed. A name and a model number. What do you expect my dog influences were Lady a Shepard mix, Astro and Scooby Do cartoon characters. I didn’t want to use the cartoon names. Wasn’t able to think of anything else. Plus, he responded instantly when I called out “Phenix”. “That’s it… I said, “…your name is Phenix 1500”. Of course his nicknames were “bonehead” and “scrawny mutt”.

One of my best memories was when we were at a grade school career day. After my presentation the teacher asked if the children could pet and interact with Phenix. I knew he couldn’t wait to interact with them. He was given permission to go the center of the classroom. Where he was instantly engulfed by the kids. I couldn’t see him. Then every once and a while his head would surface with the look of complete bliss. It was fantastic to witness.

During our first technical large animal emergency rescue classes Phenix saw horses. I thought his head was going to pop off. As soon as he saw them he began to jump up in a spinning motion that would spin him 360 degrees. His whole body wagging. Makes me laugh thinking about it.

After responding to hundreds of animal rescue calls sitting in the passenger seat next to me, after we had shut down HEAR, he retired and spent many more years living a happy life with me by my side. He also had his kitty friend Mini to keep him company. He had always liked cats and was adopted by one of our emergency rescues.

In November of 2013 I was taking an afternoon nap one day and was awakened the same startling way I would be when working a shift at the fire department or ambulance service. I’d wake knowing something was about to happen, then the call for help would come in. I woke knowing something was wrong. I didn’t smell smoke or hear a smoke detector but knew something was very wrong.

I jumped up and started looking around the house when I saw Phenix sprawled out on the floor in front of his water bowl. Dogs don’t normally lay like that I thought. He was conscious. I asked him what he needed. He lifted himself up and indicated he needed to go outside. I walked out with him. He urinated just outside the door which was not where he usually went.

He came inside and collapsed on the floor and couldn’t get back up. I carried him to his bed and lay him there. He was having difficulty breathing. It remined me of patients I’d seen with pulmonary emboli. Within about two minutes he was dead. Without any transportation to a veterinarian I rushed to get the intubation kit and oxygen. I started to intubate him but could not do it. I couldn’t locate his trachea and vocal cords after having intubated hundreds of animals for surgical procedures.

Condemning myself for failing to intubate I remembered a promise I had made when I decided to keep him. I had told him I would never go through the motions of a human cardiac arrest or have him subject to a necropsy. I had called Dr. Beug for assistance. She arrived about ten minutes later. She confirmed his death. It was a difficult moment.

We kept him in the home for us to morn. Where we witnessed the other animals in the house appear to morn his death. It took about 4 months for everyone to start getting back to normal. He was such a presence in everyone’s life all of us were affected.

We still have mementos. His crate with his name stenciled over the door, his collar, harness and his coveted ball. Today Phenix’s ashes are in a special box along with his cat Mini awaiting my death so we can all fertilize the garden together. I hope I didn’t bring you down with his story. However it must be told because he was the first official rescue and it’s why he’ll always be number one and HEAR’s icon.

Big Boss- Rescue Chief/Founder