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IPATA Responds to DOT Pet Travel Incident Report

Tuesday, July 12, 2005

The Independent Pet and Animal Transportation Association International, Inc. (IPATA) issued a response today to the Department of Transportation's (DOT) very first Animal Incident Report. I blogged about this first report a couple days ago. To clarify, the airlines are now required by federal law to report all incidents where pets were killed, injured, or lost.

To sum it up, IPATA commends the DOT for publishing these statistics, and went on to provide some other interesting facts about the reporting mandate:

  • The mandate does not require airlines to report total monthly volumes of animals transported, meaning that the number pet losses are not being put into perspective with successful pet flights.


  • Not all airlines are required to report the data to the DOT, only domestic passenger airlines transporting pets and only if they have an incident to report. Hence, if a report shows a only a handful of airlines reporting data, it means that the other airlines encountered no incidents.
IPATA also goes on to say that many pet losses are due to owner ignorance. Quotes IPATA:
"We have found that many incidents occur not because of anything the airline did or failed to do, but because the pet owner has not acted responsibly. For example, he may not have chosen a safe kennel/crate for his pet or the most ideal flight or routing, or he may have tranquilized his pet against the advice of the airlines and the American Veterinary Medical Association. And, of course, the pet owner may be unaware that his animal has a pre-existing medical condition that put the pet at high risk."
My gut says that future monthly pet incident reports are going to show that pet losses are much fewer than what animal activists are saying. At one end, we have animal activists calling for pet owners to avoid airplanes, and on the other end we have an air travel industry facing layoffs and bankruptcy filings. Moreover, the number of Americans owing pets is skyrocketing. Sounds like this issue is going to come to a boil.

2 Comments:

  • I'm glad to see this report has materialized. This way the public can determine how safe, or unsafe, airline travel is for their pets. An episode on the cancelled TV program LAX depicted a negative view on shipping pets by air. I know this was only Hollywood, and not the real world. It was done in poor taste in the name of entertainment, and reflects poorly on the integrity of those concerned. Thanks Hollywood.

    By Anonymous Joe King, at 8:31 AM, July 13, 2005  

  • The real dog news is at http://www.dogreportdotcom.com HILARIOUS STUFF. A source for politically-inclined dogs to get their drudge

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:23 PM, March 17, 2008  

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