Famed patrol dog heads for well-earned retirement after a lifetime of service

A retired police dog named Huzi recently became famous after his story was widely reported by local and even national media. He hit the headlines because he was about to work his last Spring Festival travel rush before retiring later this year.

The 14-year-old is a member of a security team that patrols a section of the Harbin-Qiqihar high-speed railway, China's most northerly high-speed railway, in Heilongjiang province. After retiring from working with the police, Huzi, Mandarin for "tiger", joined the team in 2015, when the railway opened to traffic.

The line－connecting Harbin, the provincial capital, and Qiqihar, Heilongjiang's second-largest city－has a designed speed of 250 kilometers per hour, which has reduced the journey time from three hours to just 85 minutes.

The railway has 78 lookout posts, and each section employs three patrol officers and a dog. Huzi's team patrols a section of line in Daqing, a city known for oil and coal production.

It is an extremely cold area, where wintry conditions dominate for six months of the year, so handlers and their dogs can often be seen patrolling in the snow. Huzi's daily job is to help patrol 32 km of the railway's protective barrier to check for potential hazards and ensure the line's safe operation.

In the past seven years, Huzi and his human handlers have identified and helped manage many safety hazards, including assisting police officers in detaining people whose presence is regarded as suspicious, escorting lost seniors home and locating fallen protective barriers, fires and leaks from oil wells alongside the railway.

Huzi and a coworker, Zhao Haitao, once had to help a woman who had climbed up the protective barrier. Zhao ordered Huzi to bark and run along one side of the barrier to attract the woman's attention, while he and some colleagues quickly climbed up from the other side and rescued her. The woman was later diagnosed with mental health issues, and Huzi received a reward for his part in saving her.

"Huzi is not a pet, he is my comrade," Wang Hongbin, a patrol team member, told Xinhua News Agency in a recent interview.

As Huzi is old in dog years, he will retire from the patrol team this year, and will be adopted for a peaceful retirement.

The members of the patrol are sad to be saying goodbye to Huzi, so they often visit him at work and in his kennel to bring him snacks, such as pieces of beef and ham, and they have made his home more cozy and comfortable.

"Patrolling the high-speed railway is a lonely job. However, Huzi is always there for me," Wang said.