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Petition urges protections for pets traveling by plane


GentleLake
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Dear Fellow Travelers,

 

What will happen if the flying public puts more pressure on the airlines for pet safety. They'll do the easiest thing - turn the whole business over to cargo shippers (they've already done this in or out of the uk) who in the UK charge extraordinary fees to fly a dog and you work with their schedule not vice-versa.

 

I dislike flying dogs but sometimes it's necessary and - despite this article - the airlines mostly do a good job.

 

Final question - how did these owners fly a dog during the no fly (heat) season?

Donald McCaig

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The dog that died should have NEVER been allowed to fly. I see the mastiff breeds overheat within minutes on hot days. They cannot effectively cool themselves. Did the airline screw up? Yes, but that owner should have known better than to even try to ship that dog.

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Dear Fellow Travelers,

 

What will happen if the flying public puts more pressure on the airlines for pet safety. They'll do the easiest thing - turn the whole business over to cargo shippers (they've already done this in or out of the uk) who in the UK charge extraordinary fees to fly a dog and you work with their schedule not vice-versa.

 

I dislike flying dogs but sometimes it's necessary and - despite this article - the airlines mostly do a good job.

 

Final question - how did these owners fly a dog during the no fly (heat) season?

Donald McCaig

 

This.

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So it seems to me that unfortunately Houston is kind of in the mix as well. Obviously due to the dangerously high heat this is not surprising. I have received quite a few dogs for friends at the Houston Airport. Never were any of them in an airconditioned environment when I went to pick them up. But the particular airline we deal with is very careful about having them inside the warehouse and every time there were fans on them and the dogs had plenty of water. All of them arrived in great shape.

Only issue that we ever had was a mix up on some paperwork. Which was fixed with the airlines help.

 

But I still don't like the idea of flying. This partially stems from flying my own dog to Germany many years ago. Service, flight everything was great. But due to terrible weather in Germany the flight was re routed and was grounded in very cold weather for an additional rather long period (don't remember for sure but I think it was between 3-5 hours) with my dog in the cargo area and no way to check on her. Granted, much better than heat but I was super stressed and worried about my girl. Everything was fine in the end and again, the airline was great.

 

Having been around a fair amount of airport workers...most of them are awesome. Hard workers that take their jobs very seriously. But there are also the ones that seem to not at all like their jobs and frankly don't care what they do.

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What Mr McCaig said about cost, if we fly our dog to England when we move we are looking at a $2500 one way ticket. We are looking at the one alternative the RMS Queen Mary but there is limited availability but his fare would be $700, and just like with humans it includes unlimited meals!

My friends have been flying their golden from Italy for the last few years it costs about $300 one way.

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There are a number of the criteria required for entry into the UK, including having the USDA sign of on the paperwork, after having a tapeworm treatment within 5 days of arriving in the UK, so other than flying into Paris and then taking the ferry over anything else becomes a battle against time (the only exception to this is the QM II where you are required to have the paperwork signed within 5 days of embarkation). As the whole thing makes me very nervous and I am not the nervous type but he is my dog and I want no chance of him ending up in quarantine if we have to fly we are going to Boston hand him of to British Airways who are the only airline that handle it all in-house and collect him in Heathrow.

 

The QM II though is the really cool option, if you book right, you can get an inside cabin for about $1000.00 per person and no excess baggage charges, so the three of us could get to Southampton for not much more than 1 dog on BA. From what I have read it is hard to get a kennel spot and we are not able to plan to far in advance at the moment.

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There are a number of the criteria required for entry into the UK, including having the USDA sign of on the paperwork, after having a tapeworm treatment within 5 days of arriving in the UK, so other than flying into Paris and then taking the ferry over anything else becomes a battle against time

 

My European geography's dreadful (in terms of distance). How long would it take to drive from Italy to GB?

 

As far as the tapeworm treatment, could you have it done along the way? (I'm assuming that what you mean is that the tapeworm treatments has to be done within 5 days prior to arriving, right?)

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I am trying to arrange the shipment of a puppy to Wales. It's looking like total cost will be about $800 to $1000. Is the charge that much higher because of the weight of an adult dog?

 

Its based on the size of the crate the dog needs, not its weight. My other dog Brody who was still with us when we started pricing the move, was a very standard 40lb border collie and he was going to cost $1600.00 to ship. Rievaulx is very lanky, tall dog with pointed ears, BA has a formula to figure out the correct crate size, you have to measure from the base of the neck to the start of the tail, their height to the tip of the ears, and a foreleg measurement. R needs the same size crate as a Mastiff, the largest Vari Kennel they make. My 54lb collie looks very small curled up in one, but then he stands or lays out flat and it really is the right size. They have to be lay down with the their front feet extended and not touch, and they have to be able to stand without their ears touching.

 

My European geography's dreadful (in terms of distance). How long would it take to drive from Italy to GB?

 

As far as the tapeworm treatment, could you have it done along the way? (I'm assuming that what you mean is that the tapeworm treatments has to be done within 5 days prior to arriving, right?)

The UK goverment does not make this easy, all the paper work has to be signed of by the country you are exporting from which is the US, and a USDA certified Vet has to adminster the treatment. Once we are in the UK then we can transfer him onto a UK pet passport, then he is free to travel throughout Europe, but everytime he enters he needs the tapeworm treatment, but that can be done by any vet.

It is though a huge improvement from 6 months quarantine, if that was still in place we would not be considering going to the UK, it would be somewhere else in Europe.

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