Search dog Roma and Los Angeles County Fire Fighter Derek Moree received the Pet Hero Award on Sept. 24 at Helen Woodward Animal Center’s annual Remember Me Thursday ceremony. The Los Angeles County Fire Department announced the honor on Sept. 25 and said the pair were recognized for their work in Venezuela. The department credited Roma and Moree with locating and rescuing people trapped beneath rubble after the June earthquake.
The award followed a documented stretch of training and service. The National Disaster Search Dog Foundation says Roma, a black Labrador retriever, was paired with Moree on Nov. 12, 2022, after training at its National Training Center. The team earned FEMA certification in Sacramento on March 10, 2024. SDF says that certification made them eligible for deployments across the country and internationally as part of California Task Force 2.
SDF’s profile describes Roma as energetic and highly motivated to work through play. Her trainers directed that drive into searching. The foundation says she works methodically and alerts her handler when she finds a victim. When he first met Roma, Moree’s first impression was, “Wow! This dog is a handful!” In a disaster setting, Roma searches and signals while Moree works with the rest of the response team.
From training to deployment
SDF’s general training program recruits dogs from shelters and breed rescues, gives them formal search training, pairs them with first responders, and prepares the new teams for FEMA or state certification. The foundation says formal canine training typically lasts eight to ten months, matching and handler training takes two weeks, and preparation toward certification takes about a year. Certified teams continue training to stay ready for deployment.
Roma and Moree’s profile records their own milestones: pairing in November 2022, certification in March 2024, and deployment in June 2026. The dates chart their progression from pairing to certification and later deployment. SDF describes Roma as quick and enthusiastic in training, then increasingly focused as she learned to search and alert.
The job is specific. SDF says its dogs locate live people who may be trapped in disaster wreckage. The foundation explains that dog-handler teams train weekly on rubble to reach the skill required for certification. Roma and Moree’s certification qualified them to deploy with Task Force 2, where the dog’s searching and alerting are part of a larger operation with firefighters and other specialists.
Two major earthquakes struck Venezuela on June 24, 2026. The next day, Los Angeles County’s USA-2 urban search-and-rescue task force deployed to help with the response. ABC7 reported that the 71-member group included six canine teams and would search collapsed structures for survivors. The Search Dog Foundation later listed Moree and Roma among the Los Angeles County teams deployed.
A task force effort
ABC7 reported that USA-2 spent 11 days in Venezuela before returning to Southern California in early July. The outlet described firefighters and canine teams searching through debris and showed members of the task force receiving medals for their recovery work. This independent report supplies context for the deployment LACoFD cited when it announced Roma and Moree’s award.
The fire department’s release attributes the successful location and rescue of people beneath rubble to Roma and Moree. ABC7’s reporting describes the broader task-force operation, including its six dog teams and 71 members. Read together, the accounts recognize Roma’s specific contribution while showing that search dogs work inside a coordinated emergency response.
By linking the award to a recent mission and documenting the team’s training milestones, the record shows how this kind of rescue work begins long before a deployment. Roma and Moree arrived in Venezuela as a certified team, one of six K-9 pairs supporting USA-2. The ceremony acknowledged their part in that coordinated effort.
Moree told the Search Dog Foundation that being around and interacting with dogs brings him joy. For Roma and Moree, that personal connection sits alongside a practical partnership: a trained dog and handler prepared to search as part of a larger fire service team. The Pet Hero Award recognized their joint work after the Venezuela deployment.
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