We call dogs man’s best friend, yet too often man treats dogs as disposable property. Every year, 3.1 million dogs enter shelters and nearly 400,000 of those are euthanized because they can’t find homes. Very often that happens even though the dogs have the temperament for family life. They just aren’t lucky enough to be in the right place. There are homes for most shelter dogs if they only had transportation to get them where loving families await them. That’s the idea behind Operation Frodo.
Founded in 2022, Operation Frodo is the brainchild of automotive journalist, Nik Miles. Nik was looking to adopt a beagle when he came across this picture of a rescue named Frodo. Given that the other dogs in his home were named Samwise, Galadriel, and Pippin, he had no choice but to adopt him. The one problem, Frodo was 2,000 miles away from his Portland, Oregon home in Omaha, Nebraska. So he needed to go get him.
What he learned from the folks at the Bassett and Beagle Rescue of the Heartland (BBRH) was there are an abundance of beagles in the midwest due to hunters who abandon dogs they no longer want, puppy mills with too many litters, and medical testing labs who retire dogs after their research is done. But on the west coast, beagles in shelters wait just a day or two on average before they are adopted. So he decided in addition to bringing Frodo home , he would take three other dogs along and deliver them to the Cascade Beagle Rescue in Portland where they had homes waiting for them.
The other layer to this story is that Nik’s love for dogs led him to create the non-profit, Animal Rescue Rigs, an organization that builds and donates rescue vehicles to shelters who need them. Last year, I was one of a team of drivers who delivered the first rig, Paws 1, to Omaha where it was donated to BBRH to help them rescue and transport animal. After dropping off Paws 1, Nik picked up the four dogs in a Wagoneer on loan from Jeep and drove the 1650 miles back to Portland. Along the way, he began scheming a bigger and better operation for 2023.
And so it was after months of work, a convoy of vehicles loaded with 12 dogs, left Omaha, Nebraska on Sunday, December 17th and headed west to Portland. Our first stop was Denver, Colorado, where two of our charges, a pair of Boston Terriers, were delivered to families waiting to adopt them. The vehicles for the trip had been loaned to us by manufacturers, a Subaru Crosstrek Sport, Hyundai Santa Fe, Nissan Pathfinder Rock Creek Edition, and Ford Expedition XLT Max. In addition to vehicles, Subaru and Hyundai also provided financial support for the mission to cover the cost of gas, meals, hotels, and other supplies. Hey, puppy pads aren’t cheap.
Over the course of four days, 15 journalist drove at least one leg of the journey with at least two dogs in each car. Nik, Javier Mota, and Jose Carlos de Mier drove all the way. Tanya Gazdik, Nathan Adlen, and I drove from Omaha to Salt Lake City. Bev Braga and Teia Collier drove from Omaha To Denver. Elizabeth Williams, Daniel Velarde, and Stewart Webb joined us in Denver and went all the way to Portland. Sue Mead, Jeff Zurschmeide, and Teppy Wigington met us in Salt Lake City and finished the trip as well.
Each night was spent at a La Quinta Inn as they are pet-friendly hotels and the dogs were assigned to rooms with each driver. Smartly, I volunteered to chaperone two puppies. After our second day on the road, someone at La Quinta got wind of our mission and they waived the pet fees for the next two nights, while delivering goody bags for the dogs.
After a harrowing drive in 2022 that was marked by below zero temperatures, high winds, and road closures, this year’s trip was uneventful when it came to the drive. Temperatures eclipsed 50 each day and our vehicles behaved flawlessly. A big surprise to me was the smallest vehicle of the fleet. The Subaru Crosstrek Sport swallowed two dog crates, all the supplies necessary to care for our dogs, and our luggage with ease. Its ride was also much more supple than I remembered providing a confident, comfortable, and efficient ride. This was my first opportunity to road trip with a dog and what I learned was it’s easy as long as you don’t mind stopping every two to three hours. We carefully mapped out our route with stops a third of the along each leg that would allows us to refuel, grab a bite, and let the dogs stretch out their legs.
The crew arrived early afternoon of December 20th at Dick Hannah Jeep in Vancouver, Washington, just across the Columbia River from Portland. Many of the dogs were handed off to the Cascade Rescue team. A few were loaded into a generously donated Honda Passport and continued a few hours north to Seattle Beagle Rescue where homes awaited them.
Planning will begin shortly for Operation Frodo 2024, which promises to be even bigger saving more dogs. If you’d like to donate to help next years crew and help Animal Rescue Rigs build more rescue vehicles, visit the ARR website and hit the Donate Now button in the upper right hand corner.
