Two puppies wait to be loaded onto a cargo hold as part of a Boone Flight Project charter flight.
LAUREN Cabrera, the president of Saipan Humane Society, is calling for regular pet shipping services for the CNMI, which she said could reduce animal suffering.
She said in her experience with SHS, pet owners who leave the CNMI have few options to ship their pets with them.
Cabrera said if pets on Saipan are not abandoned, they are left at the Saipan Dog Control Program because pets are not allowed as cargo on United Airlines flights. If not adopted, these animals are euthanized, Cabrera said.
The Boonie Flight Project, a SHS partner organization, works with a pet shipping company to organize charter flights that bring dogs and cats from Saipan to new adopting families in the states.
Cabrera said these pet shipping services are costly.
“More and more people [in the CNMI] are taking really good care of their pets, but when they have to move off island, their pets’ ticket will cost more than their own ticket,” Cabrera said. “Pets are being abandoned and left behind on our islands as families struggle financially with the cost of transport. Dogs that would be quickly adopted on the mainland are euthanized for lack of adopters in our region, when they could have been flown to a mainland adopter or rescue.”
One former Saipan resident, Tina Ngo, said spent thousands of dollars to bring her animals to Saipan and then to California.
“I spent $6500 to fly two cats from California to Saipan when I first moved to Saipan,” Ngo said. “I spent $12,000 to fly four cats from Saipan to California when I moved back to California.”
Although Ngo said she was pleased with the “extraordinarily professional and trustworthy” charter service, she acknowledges that the price of moving pets is expensive.
“I know many people coming to or from Saipan who cannot afford those fees,” she added.
Ngo believes that the lack of regular pet shipping service has led to pets being “abandoned left and right” instead of accompanying their owners.
Aria Keilbach, co-founder of Boonie Babies, said she is “devastated” and “extremely frustrated” by animal suffering connected to a lack of pet shipping service.
“Pet shipping is a basic service that is accessible worldwide,” Keilbach said. “Families [in the CNMI] that are moving are forced to abandon and leave behind their beloved pets. Mainland adoptions are impossible, which not only ends the lives of individual dogs but also increases the overpopulation of stray dogs here.”
Cabrera hopes United Airlines ends its moratorium on animal shipping. She noted that military members on Guam can ship their animals on United Airlines flights if their pet owners are ordered to switch their place of deployment.
She said the CNMI should also be exempted from cabotage restrictions.
“We are a unique situation and it’s important that our needs are addressed in unique ways,” she added. “It is hard to see people and animals suffer simply because we are in a remote location. [United Airlines] discontinued pet shipping in 2018. How long is too long?”
Variety was unable to get a comment from United Airlines.
