Pilbara police welcome canine recruit

The Pilbara District’s first police dog has officially arrived in the region.

Seventeen month old Belgian Malinois police dog Maygar stopped by Karratha yesterday en route from Perth to his new home of Hedland.

The even-tempered canine and his handler First Class Constable Tom Gryta will be based at Port Hedland police station, where he will start work on Monday, but is able to be deployed throughout Hedland and the wider region as needed.

Maygar is also the WA Police’s first dual purpose police dog on staff, able to work on general purpose jobs but also sniff out drugs and cash.

First Class Const. Gryta said Maygar would be an asset to Pilbara police on a wide range of assignments.

“Now we’ll be able to provide local officers with the ability to locate some of these offenders if they do decide to flee scenes prior to police arriving, and then on the narcotics side — pretty much he’s just about capable of finding anything anywhere,” he said.

“He’s been in the training environment, certainly we’ve challenged him and he finds the goods every time.”

“Hopefully any of those sorts of tricks that offenders may try to use to deter detection, we’ll be able to come up trumps.”

Magyar has already been warming up to his time up north, having taken a dip in Exmouth waters during his travels and yesterday enjoying the hospitality of Karratha police before arriving in Hedland.

The police dog’s introduction follows an announcement by the Police Minister in June for more Hedland police resources, which also included seven extra officers.