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A police dog died in Hawaii last week after being left unattended inside a hot car, according to the police department where the dog had served since 2021. In a news release announcing the K-9’s death, the interim police chief at the Hawaii Police Department called the incident “a preventable tragedy.”
The dog was 6 and a half years old and named Archer, according to the department, which operates on the Big Island of Hawaii. Originally from Hungary, Archer was trained to detect narcotics and served “in numerous operations” alongside its handler, the department said.
Archer died Sept. 4, following an “unacceptable period of time” alone inside a police vehicle, according to the department. Reed Mahuna, the interim police chief, said in a statement that criminal and administrative investigations would proceed in order to determine what went wrong and how to prevent it from happening again in the future. The K-9 handler involved in the case was devastated, according to the police chief.
Hawaii Police Department
“This was a preventable tragedy, dogs should not be left unattended in a vehicle for any period of time,” Mahuna said in the statement, describing Archer as “a partner, protector, and member of our police family.”
“Please be mindful that you should never leave a dog in a hot car, leaving your car in the shade, with water for the dog or with the windows partially down even in mild weather will not prevent your dog from overheating,” the statement continued. “Hundreds of dogs die each year being left unattended in vehicles and that number is surely much higher as many cases are never reported.”
Heat exhaustion is a leading cause of death for working K-9s, and such incidents often happen inside of patrol cars, the National Police Dog Foundation notes on its website. The foundation advocates for special heat alarms that can be installed in police vehicles to alert handlers when a K-9 may be overheating.
But those types of alarm systems aren’t necessarily foolproof, either. In July, a newly deputized K-9 died in Georgia after being left unattended inside of its handler’s patrol car, as the heat index reached triple digits. In that instance, the sheriff’s office that deputized the K-9 said the patrol car’s cooling system and heat alarm had malfunctioned.
Another police dog died in a different part of Georgia in June 2023, after being left inside its handler’s hot car without a functioning air conditioning system.
