People of the CBSA: Tracey Skelton's story - Video transcript

Transcript

Tracey Skelton, Detector Dog Handler on-screen.

My name is Tracey Skelton. I’m a Border Services Officer. I’m also a K9 handler.

So primarily I work out of the Vancouver International Mail Centre. But I also get to work at other locations.

My dog is Kaya. She comes to work with me every morning, and we look for drugs.

Tracey speaking to Kaya: Searching, let’s go.

She searches for your common drugs including fentanyl.

Speaking to Kaya: Check up here.

Kaya’s part of the program to combat the opioid crisis that we’ve seen and that’s been very, very rampant.

On-screen text: Products suspected to contain fentanyl are opened under a fume hood.

A lot of times the narcotics are not evident. You know, you don’t open a package and see white powder. My team will then open up that product, however it may be, whether it’s an electronic device or whether it’s an oven.

So sometimes it takes a lot of time. I’ll take my dog back to her kennel and I’ll bring her back out, so she can re-indicate on the area that she initially indicated on. And then her payday is her ball or her Kong.

Speaking to Kaya: Good girl Kaya (clapping). Go get it.

So just like we like to get paid every two weeks, my dog likes to get paid after she finds her drugs.

Speaking to Kaya: Is play your paycheck? Yeah.

So every time she comes in for a search, she’s really energetic, she’s really happy to be there, and she just wants to go and go.

Speaking to Kaya: Yeah, good job! Good job!

She knows she’s one of those working hero dogs.

Speaking to Kaya: You’re going to be a movie star (laughing)!

Canada wordmark appears.