@time

The dusty white cargo plane stood out among the gleaming corporate jets, as did its passengers: 48 barking dogs, newly arrived at the private air terminal. They had left Mississippi that morning with their health certificates taped to their kennels. On the tarmac, Danielle Bowes, a staff member at Second Chance Animal Services, checked her list. When she found Bravo, a 1-year-old collie and American blue heeler mix, she cooed into his cage, “Hi, Pretty, you’re going to go quick!” Back at Second Chance, the dogs will quarantine for 48 hours, per Massachusetts state law, before they go up for adoption. If past experience is any guide—and transports like this arrive nearly every week all over the country, by plane, truck, and van—they will be gone in a few days. There is not a dog shortage in America, but there are stark geographic differences in supply and demand. Massachusetts needs more dogs, and Mississippi has too many. To compensate, sophisticated dog–relocation networks have sprung up over the past decade, transporting dogs and cats from states with too many to states with too few. Mostly, it’s a tactical problem: “How do we connect those shelters that have too many animals and are at risk of euthanasia simply because they were born there, to those shelters where these animals are gonna fly off the shelves?” says Matt Bershadker, CEO of the ASPCA, the New York–based animal-welfare giant, which sponsored and organized the flight arriving at Hanscom. Read how the great dog run helped to save millions of dogs at the link in our bio. Photographs by @evan_angelastro for TIME

February 08, 2022