At 7 years old, Tal is a 58-pound Akbash and Molly is a one-year-old Walker Coonhound. Both dogs have been trained for therapy with the Bourqueas de Corazon relief team.
As relatives of the missing wait news of the site of a Miami building that collapsed three days ago, Bouríqueas de Corazón hopes the dogs will help victims and community members process their emotions.
“We are dealing with various families who are being referred to us at the community centre. One of the reasons for this is that they are having panic attacks or anxiety problems and we are able to make them work with dogs, touch the dog, vent their emotions. So we are working on words with them and the dogs are working on feelings with them,” said group president Linda Perez.
He explained how the treatment was done.
“They can touch the dog, they can feel the dog, they can make that eye contact. It’s so cold. The animals are absorbing everything they’re feeling at the same time and that There can be a lot of comfort for them,” he said.
Perez explained that his organization partners with other groups that train therapy dogs and that they are prepared to be with victims for extended periods of time as soon as the news starts to come in.
Along with the bilingual team, the team works in Spanish and English – a reflection of the Miami area, which is home to the Jewish and Latin American diaspora.
“We work with Argentine families, last night we had more than four families from Argentina. We had a family from Paraguay that was in the (community) center. These guys from Houston, Texas – we were with them yesterday too It doesn’t matter what your nationality is. All we want to do is offer them our hearts with this small gesture”, Perez said.
More than 150 people still missing And, three days after the collapse, the teams still found no sign of life.
Video: Part of a building collapses in Florida
