Rescue dog, searchers honored for Haiti work

SUBURBAN WEST PALM BEACH, FL -- One biscuit means the world to Blaze, a black-and-white border collie from Palm Beach County.

Blaze spent twelve days in Haiti and rescued two people from the rubble; one adult and one two-year-old girl six days after the quake.

The little girl has been reunited with her family and now Blaze has been reunited with his: the Palm Beach County Fire Rescue team.  

Blaze, his handler, Palm Beach County Fire Rescue Fire Medic Steve Driscoll, and several other Firefighter/Paramedics from Palm Beach County, Boynton Beach, Palm Beach Gardens, and West Palm Beach were honored Thursday for their rescue work in Haiti.

Among the FEMA Urban Search and Rescue Team members honored were Captain Matt Haywood and Lt. D.J. Minor from Palm Beach Gardens Fire Rescue, Firefighter/Paramedic Vance Carpenter from Boynton Beach Fire Rescue, Battalion Chief Mark Anderson, Driscoll, and Blaze from Palm Beach County Fire Rescue.

The Urban Search and Rescue Team works to save lives and, like their colleagues back home, they all lend a hand... or a paw... to help wherever and whenever they are needed.

Carpenter recalls rescuing a man from Haiti's Caribbean Market. "The first one brought out was a gentleman, and as he was coming down a ladder he gave a wave and a smile and a thumbs up...and that's incredible just to see,"  he says.

The Florida teams saved close to 20 lives in Haiti. The United States team as a whole saved over 40 and Blaze served the K-9 squad well.

You could say it's all in the family.

Another dog of Driscoll's, Lexus, traveled to Turkey with him following a massive earthquake in 1999.

Blaze has been training for eight years to do the same. 

Driscoll says the Haiti mission is her best one yet. 

Gratitude can be shown in many ways.

On Thursday for Blaze all it took was a biscuit.

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