Standard, an eight-month-old Labrador retriever, could not bear the four-hour trip locked in the hold of an intercity bus that completed the route from Santa Rosa de Osos to Caucasia (Colombia). The dog died shortly after lowering the vehicle after a heat attack or suffocation, according to Coonorte, the company in charge of the movement.
The puppy ended up in the hold of the bus because its owner did not have the money to pay the necessary extra to take it up with him. In order not to leave him on the ground, the driver suggested that he take him downstairs, arguing that “nothing is wrong with him there,” reports the local newspaper El Colombiano. According to the regulations, additional fare payment is required for dogs when they are over 28 centimeters tall and require this space.
The Coonorte bus traveled 208 kilometers in four hours. According to the company, they stopped halfway and “saw how the dog was and noticed it well, without problems.” However, at that first stop they had not even gone halfway.
Standard spent another two hours in a wooden box in the vehicle’s hold. According to El Colombiano, at the end of the journey at the Caucasia bus terminal, they took out the box and noticed that something was wrong. The animal showed signs of fatigue and suffocation.
The passengers tried unsuccessfully to revive this eight-month-old Labrador Retriever, who ended up dying. “The dog made it to Caucasia and got off the bus alive. Apparently, a heat attack or suffocation caused his death, in a fact that we regret as a company,” Raúl Ceballos, Coonorte’s operations manager, explained to this newspaper.
