The naming of Search Dogs Luka and Victor
Saturday, March 7, 2020, marked an important day for SDF as we were grateful to meet and present the United States Marine Corps
Squadron HMLA-469 with a very special gift, honoring their fellow soldiers killed in action during rescue operations in Nepal in 2015. Visiting with friends and family of the soldiers at Camp Pendleton in San Diego, California, SDF search teams celebrated the forging of a new partnership while remembering those fallen that brought everyone together.
The story of how these courageous heroes, both military and fire servicemembers, came to have their lives connected by two search dogs began back in the summer of 2017, when SDF was contacted by Haven Humane Society in Redding, CA about an energetic Lab-mix named Manny, who was surrendered to the shelter after his owner was given a life-term prison sentence for criminal charges. During the shelter’s assessment of Manny, staff realized he possessed an intense drive for a ball and immediately contacted SDF to evaluate him for our program.
Meanwhile, around the same time, a Belgian Malinois was picked up as a stray by the Tracy Police Department Animal Control a few hundred miles south. Named Gator while at the shelter, he was adopted on several occasions but was returned to the shelter each time because he was “too much dog” for the average family to handle.
Both canines were evaluated for our program, passed their screenings, and were happily given new “leashes on life” as Search Dog candidates in training. Since SDF had previously trained search 
dogs named Manny and Gator, the decision was made to give both candidates new names to match their heroic personalities and future career paths. The month prior, SDF had begun communicating with Lieutenant Colonel Powers of the United States Marine Corps who had worked alongside six SDF-trained Canine Disaster Search Teams in 2015 when U.S. task forces were mobilized to assist after a deadly 8.1 magnitude earthquake struck Nepal.
Tragically, during the rescue mission, a U.S. helicopter crashed in the Himalayas on May 12, 2015. Lt. Col. Powers and SDF staff decided it would be a fitting tribute to rename our new canine heroes in remembrance of those who lost their lives during that relief mission. Manny was renamed Victor, in honor of the call sign of the Marine UH-1Y Huey helicopter that crashed. Gator was renamed Luka, in honor of Captain Dustin R. Lukasiewicz, one of the six Marines who lost his life that day.
Victor and Luka graduated from our program in April 2018 and were partnered with their new firefighter-handlers. At the graduation ceremony, SDF was honored to host representatives of Joint Task Force 505 United States Marine Corps – Major Danny Byrd, Sergeant Robert Brown and Captain Charles Kuhnmuench – who served with the fallen soldiers in Nepal.
Victor was paired with Handler Billy Walkenhorst of the City of Santee Fire Department and member of California Task Force 8. Luka was partnered with firefighter Adam Leckonby of the New York State Division of Homeland Security & Emergency Services Office of Fire Prevention and Control and member of New York Task Force 2, based in Albany.
We are proud that Search Dogs Victor and Luka will carry on the legacy of the six fallen Marines, bravely and selflessly serving communities in need when disaster strikes.
See the original printed feature article in SDF's Fall 2018 Bark Alert magazine.
