New Delhi (The Stellar News) Saksham Kalia: Two year old, Belgian Shepherd, also known as Melinois died last night after serving bravely for his nation. Army’s assault Dog, “Zoom” who sustained gunshot wounds earlier this week while battling terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir’s Anantnag District, succumbed to injuries.
The Dog was a very active, furious and trained to locate and down the terrorists was tasked to locate and down the terrorists hiding in a home in Anantnag. Zoom performing his duty, located two terrorists and attacked them but sustained two gunshots, despite of injury, the dog keep fighting against the terrorists resulting the killing of two Laskar-e-tahiba terrorists.
The officials said Zoom was under treatment at the Advance Field Veterinary Hospital in Srinagar, but succumbed around noon. “Zoom’s condition was improving and the canine was responding well to the treatment. The dog looked fine till noon after which it suddenly started gasping and soon collapsed,” the officials said.
Zoom was trained to retrieve the weapons from terrorists hiding in buildings. The dog is learnt to have approached the target stealthily and pounced upon the terrorists. “Zoom was fired upon by the terrorists in hiding, injuring it seriously. However, the dog was successful in destabilising the terrorists, who were then effectively neutralised through precision fire,” the Army had said on the day of the operation.
On June 30, another Army dog, Axel, had died in a counter-terrorism operation in Kashmir. Like Zoom, the two-year-old Axel, also a Belgian Shepherd, was deputed for an ‘intervention task’–to locate a terrorist inside a building. On August 15, Axel was awarded a gallantry award, ‘Mentioned in despatches’, for “resolute courage by rushing towards the building entrance while exposing itself to the terrorist’s fire”.
