IRO’s dog teams stand their yearly test at numerous national missions, representing the bigger part of their work – at accidents, avalanches or other disasters.

Being part of an international deployment means demanding qualification demands. To curtail “disaster tourism” of independent teams the UN only wants to appoint highly specialized Urban Search and Rescue Teams (USAR) matching standardized guidelines. Many governmental teams consisting of physicians, technicians and other specialists advance with own aircrafts and equipment. “Biological search device”, though, is also indispensable for USAR-teams: a dog’s good nose at first search is by far superior to any technical procedure.

IRO keeps contact to many USAR-teams and ensures the rescue-dog component. Suggestions of the working group of the International Search and Rescue Advisory Group (INSARAG) for international deployment were also overtaken for the IRO Mission Readiness Test, so that the quality of training is at its highest level.