March 25, 2009 -- Rookie musher Timothy Hunt received the Red Lantern Award for being the last to finish the 2009 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race yesterday, but the mood wasn't entirely festive at the finish line on the race's final day. Officials continue to investigate why six dogs died during or shortly after the grueling 1,049-mile journey from Willow to Nome, Alaska.
An average of around three dogs die each year during the race, though five were lost in 1997.
Chas St. George, director of public relations for the Iditarod, told Discovery News, "we must go through a process to investigate the deaths, and that is still taking place."
"Our goal is no deaths," he added. "There is nothing worse than to lose a dog, and we are all very sad about the losses."
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Two of the dogs, five-year-old Maynard and eight-year-old Omen, experienced "pulmonary edema," or fluid accumulation in the lungs. In both cases, race marshal Mark Nordman said the condition "likely developed as the result of a cardiac abnormality" rather than race conditions.
St. George added that a "myriad of reasons" could have led to the dogs' abnormal heart function.
"If you take any group of 1,072 dogs, which is about what we had at the start of the Iditarod, a certain number of deaths could occur over a two-week period," he said.
Nordman also determined that a two-year-old female named Cirque died while her team, which had to drop out of the race, was being flown out of the trail area.
"On the flight back to Nome the aircraft encountered significant turbulence," Nordman said. "By the time the pilot was about to land in Golovin, it was discovered that one of the dogs (Cirque) was deceased."
It's suspected that two other dogs, Grasshopper and Dizzy, died from hypothermia in -45 degree Fahrenheit temperatures. Musher Lou Packer, who owned the dogs, told the Anchorage Daily News that he felt ice forming under the skin of at least one dog before it died, but he said there was nothing he could do to help the animal.
St. George said this year's race was especially challenging because of the large number of "local ground storms, which are hard to forecast. When in these storms, it's like being sandblasted for eight to 12 miles."
He said "it's possible" that even more casualties might have occurred this year, were it not for a new high-tech tracking system that allowed officials to closely monitor the movements of all race participants.
Animal rights groups, however, question whether Alaska's animal cruelty laws were violated.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) sent a letter to the director of the Alaska State Troopers, Col. Audie Holloway, urging him "to launch a criminal investigation."
"The Iditarod is more than 1,000 miles of torment for these dogs," said Debbie Leahy, director of PETA.
Although authorities will continue to look into the precise cause of death for the dog deaths still under investigation, it is very unlikely that the mushers will be charged with a crime.
Only last year did Alaska make animal cruelty a felony. As it stands, an individual would have to be convicted of three instances of animal cruelty, abandonment or neglect before a felony charge could be made.
Representative Carl Gatto, however, is sponsoring a new bill that would strengthen Alaska's existing animal cruelty laws. It reads, in part, "HB138 makes knowingly and intentionally inflicting severe prolonged pain or suffering upon an animal a felony."
But the bill also bears a caveat; it "recognizes dog mushing as the sport it is."
Related Links:
Iditarod: The Toughest Race on Earth
Jennifer Viegas' Blog: Born Animal
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