Music Festival Organisers: 3 Things to be Aware of When Working With Drug Detection Dogs
Music festivals are becoming increasingly popular among young people in Australia. If you are organising a music festival, you may be concerned about people bring illegal drugs onto the site. As part of your licence agreement with the local authorities, you will have to be able to prove that you have taken all reasonable steps to prevent illegal drug use at the event. One way of preventing drugs from entering the festival is by using a trained drug detection dog to sniff people and their bags as they enter. Below is a guide to 3 things you should consider when working with a drug detection dog.
The types of drugs the dog can detect
Dogs can be trained to detect a range of illegal substances. Before you hire a drug detection dog and a handler from a security company, you should check which drugs it is trained to detect. This way, you can be sure that the dog is offering you the protection you need. For example, if you live in an area where a particular drug is very popular, you will want to ensure that the dog has been trained to sniff out that drug.
The maximum duration of active drug detection activity
Drug detection dogs are not robots. This means that they can only carry out effective detection for a limited period. The length of active drug detection activity will vary from dog to dog and will largely depend on the age of the dog, how quickly it becomes tired, and the level of stress it experiences in the search environment. An experienced dog handler should be able to tell you roughly how long their dog can carry out effective searches for. The handler will also be able to detect any signs that the dog is tired, stressed or isn't carrying out effective searches. Knowing the maximum duration of effective drug detection activity will allow you to hire additional dogs so you can rotate them for full-time coverage of the entry point into your festival.
The liaison process with local law enforcement
Finally, you need to establish how the security company will liaise with local law enforcement agencies. This step is necessary because the private security agents do not have any formal powers of arrest.
If you would like to find out more about hiring a drug detection dog, you should contact a security company today for further advice and information.