THE CANINE HEROES OF 9/11

100 search and rescue dogs were deployed to the World Trade Center and Pentagon in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. These heroic canines worked with heroic emergency service workers and firemen to search tirelessly for survivors stranded beneath the rubble.

In 2011, Charlotte Dumas published a book of portraits entitled, “Retrieved,” portraits of the 12 dogs still alive, a decade after their service.

In my memory, the photographs of these dogs that appeared in the newspapers stayed with me most strongly: a dog being transported in a stokes basket on cables suspended high over the wreckage; another dog intently searching while maneuvering over enormous bend beams; dogs receiving eye drops after and in between shifts.

-Charlotte Dumas, 2011