Crash puts man on a mission about safety of pets in cars

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STL Today

By Michelle Meehan

COLLINSVILLE

On a frigid February evening, Thomas "Rod" Rodriguez of Collinsville climbed behind the wheel of his Oldsmobile, his 7-year-old miniature poodle, Holly, perched on his lap. The pair was headed to visit an elderly friend in a nursing home. They did not count on hitting a patch of ice.

"We were in a head-on collision," remembered Rodriguez, 75, a retired airline employee. "I was OK. But Holly was sitting on my left leg when it happened. The air bag came right out and hit her. I could hear her whimpering. I thought, 'Oh my God, I've broken her neck.'"

Rodriguez asked a police officer on the scene to call an ambulance.

"He said, 'Are you hurt?' I said, 'No. Not for me. For my dog. Please call an ambulance. I'll pay for it.' He said he couldn't call an ambulance for a dog."

So a passerby rushed Rodriguez and Holly to the Animal Emergency Center in Collinsville, where the severely injured poodle was treated for the next several days.

Fast-forward nearly four years. On a recent Tuesday morning, the small white dog lay snuggled in the sheets of her master's bed. She runs the house, Rodriguez said.

"She's completely blind since the accident," said Rodriguez, who has made it his mission to educate the public about the dangers of dogs riding in cars with air bags. "People strap their children in the back seat to protect them. But they don't think about their pets."

Ben Johnson, a veterinary ophthalmologist with Animal Eye Associates in St. Louis, had seen Holly for cataracts before the accident. Because of her pre-existing condition, Johnson said, he cannot be certain the air bag blinded her.

"I wouldn't say it didn't have anything to do with it," Johnson said, noting that the dog was already blind in one eye before the wreck. "The air bag very well could have contributed. But I can't say to what extent."

Holly is not the first of the specialist's patients to be injured while riding in a car.

"We see dogs who have been driving down the road with their heads sticking out the window, and then they get bugs or foreign debris in their eyes," Johnson said.

The veterinarian's wife drives with her Cavalier King Charles spaniel sitting in her lap. "My wife has bought a harness, and she still doesn't put it on the dog," Johnson admitted. "She just loves the Cavalier sitting in her lap and kissing her in the face while she drives."

Perhaps she should talk to Rodriguez. If he had his way, all dogs would ride in the back seat secured with safety restraints. Holly now travels strapped inside a carrier, he said, and it doesn't bother her a bit.

It also means one less potential distraction behind the wheel for Rodriguez.

The use of such car safety devices for pets is part of a growing trend, said Carol Hogenson, manager of the O'Fallon PetSmart. PetSmart offers a variety of travel safety devices for dogs, including dog safety harnesses, seat belts and booster chairs that allow little dogs to see out the window.

"I don't think we can ever be too safe with our children or our animals in a car," Hogenson said. "I wouldn't think about riding in a car without a seat belt. For some people their pets are their children."

Rodriguez, a widower, takes his poodle with him everywhere he goes. "She rides first class with me in airplanes," he said, laying a black Samsonite pet carrier on the floor in front of his easy chair. "Watch this. 'Come here Holly!'" The poodle snuggled up inside the carrier and fell asleep.

"She can get around the house," he said. "She uses her sense of smell, and she does pretty good. But it hasn't been easy.

"Everywhere I go, when I see people with their little dogs in the front seat, I tell them my story. I tell them, 'Put her in the backseat. Put her in a carrier. Otherwise you're gonna cry your eyes out.'"