With an unmatched sense of smell, search dogs can cover large areas quickly, work in any terrain or weather, and locate missing persons when time is critical.
WHO WE ARE
SARDA Ireland is a 100% voluntary organisation made of up members who support the training and deployment of dog & handler teams used for the search and rescue of missing persons.
WHAT WE DO
We train all year and are on-call 24-7-365.
Our training takes place regionally and nationally.
We primarily train and deploy in mountain environments as well as lowland and urban settings.
HOW WE DO IT
We utilise a dog’s naturally strong sense of smell which can be anything between 10,000 to 100,000 times stronger than a human’s.
We train our air-scenting dog’s to identify a human scent in an open area and home in on the source of the scent before returning to their handler and indicating the “find” and then leading the handler to the missing person.
We train our scent-specific dog’s to distinguish a specific scent from other scents and follow the trail of that scent to lead the handler to the missing person.
2-Year Training
It takes a minimum of 2 years to train a handler and dog team.
Who We
Work With
We are one of 11 teams that are part of Mountain Rescue Ireland (www.mountainrescue.ie). We work alongside these teams during search and rescue callouts. We also support, An Garda Síochána, The Irish Coast Guard and Civil Defense.
Make A Donation
SARDA Ireland is a 100% voluntary organisation. Our highly trained dog teams are on call day and night, ready to search for missing persons across mountains, forests, urban areas, and beyond.
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Callouts to date for 2026
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Operational handler and dog teams.
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Training hours (combined local and national for operational and aspirational teams) to date for 2026.