LANSING, MI (WHTC) – Michigan citizens will soon benefit from the services of 12 new canine teams, as well one replacement team, that graduated from the Michigan State Police 2017 Basic Canine School.
The largest class of new teams in the department’s history, the MSP has 43 canine teams strategically placed throughout the state whose handlers answer calls for service 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The unit handles more than 6,000 requests for service annually, making it one of the largest and busiest in the country.
The Basic Canine School is a 14-week intense training program conducted in-house by veteran MSP Canine Unit members. The handlers received more than 500 hours of instruction and the canine teams covered more than 100 miles on foot as they received training in various disciplines including tracking, narcotics detection, building search, area search, property search, obedience and aggression.
The last Basic Canine School graduation was in December 2015 when six new teams graduated.
The MSP Canine Unit was established in 1960. Nearly all of its canines are German shepherds due to the breed’s ability to handle the various functions and stress with intelligent problem-solving abilities and a high work drive. The unit provides services in explosive, accelerant and cadaver detection, as well as the tactical entry dog program, which provides services to the MSP Emergency Support Team.
Within the last year, the unit added two black labs to focus specifically on evolving crimes. One is trained to detect explosives in motion and one is trained to identify high-tech evidence like computer equipment.
