Original Article: https://blog.theanimalrescuesite.greatergood.com/farm-animal-disaster/
When natural disasters strike, animal shelters can find themselves overwhelmed with pets, while dealing with reduced or damaged facilities. There are federal resources that support the rescue and care of household pets, but many other animals are being left behind to face a horrific death.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has several Individual Assistance programs designed to support disaster survivors and household pets, under the >PETS Act passed in 2006 shortly after Hurricane Katrina.
This law requires that states “account for the needs of individuals with household pets and service animals before, during, and following a major disaster or emergency.” Since then, more than 30 states have amended their disaster relief plans to account for the needs of companion animals and service animals.
There are no laws protecting farmed animals in emergencies or natural disasters.
However, according to the Animal Legal Defense Fund the PETS Act only provides for certain companion animals, including service animals, dogs, cats, birds, rabbits, rodents, and turtles, but excluding reptiles other than turtles, fish, amphibians, farmed animals, horses, and others.
As Animal Outlook reports, There are no laws protecting farmed animals in emergencies or natural disasters.
The PETS Act only provides for certain companion animals, not farm animals.
At least 3.4 million chickens and turkeys and more than 5,500 pigs died during Hurricane Florence in 2018, more than the animal deaths reported when Hurricane Matthew decimated the same area a few years earlier, Mother Jones reports.
More than 9 million pigs were at risk, but no laws required farmers to have a contingency plan in place to even consider the welfare of those pigs, let alone requiring them to move those animals to safety, CounterPunch reports.
At least 3.4 million chickens and turkeys and more than 5,500 pigs died during hurricane Florence.
These animals drowned in the floodwaters or starved when food and water rations ran out or automated systems failed. According to World Animal Protection, an unknown number of animals suffered from injury and diseases following the storms and may have died later or been killed in order to be included in insurance claims. Owners reportedly left the barns locked so that the animals would drown so they could collect on the insurance.
The contamination from multiple breached hog waste lagoons was still being cleaned up years later, by which time the waste had killed an unknown number of fish and other wildlife, NPR reports.
At least 3.4 million chickens and turkeys and more than 5,500 pigs died during Hurricane Florence.
According to the Humane Society of the United States, having thousands of animals on one farm makes it impossible to design reasonable evacuation or mitigation plans, so farmed animals are locked in sheds—often in cages and crates—where they’re unable to flee the rising floodwaters.
Guidance from federal government on safe evacuation plans for factory farms, like that outlined by the University of Minnesota Extension would help prevent millions of senseless animal deaths when disasters strike, a pressing need as climate change is increasing the frequency of hurricanes and other natural disasters, NASA reports.
Animals can drown in hurricane floodwaters or be starved when food and water rations ran out or automated systems fail.
Help us ask the federal government to take action and prevent countless unnecessary deaths. Click below to make a difference.
Source: The Animal Rescue Site Blog
