I’m one of the people who admits, a bit guiltily, that I don’t restrain my dogs in the car. My reasons are varied:
- I don’t have enough room for four LARGE dog crates and groceries
- I don’t think a Dane-sized crate would fit into the car at all
- I’m too lazy to move four crates in and out of the car depending on the cargo I need to haul
- I don’t think the crates would be secure in a crash. I think I’d rather have a dog coming at me than a dog in a crate coming at me.
I have a Honda Element. We’ve removed the rear seats so the entire cargo area is open. I haul dogs, flowers, groceries, furniture, and dog training supplies. There aren’t any seats the dogs can sit in, so we’re not able to use the doggie seats or even harnesses that attach to seatbelts. For us, it’s crates or nothing when it comes to restraining our dogs.
I don’t think a bungee cord would hold a dog crate steady in a car crash. So instead of a projectile dog, I’d have a projectile crate with a dog in it.
Which is why my dogs ride free in the car.
As you can see below (can you find all four?), our dogs like to lay squishy — all over one another. In the Element, they lay nicely on the cushy dog beds in the cargo area of the Element. They sleep soundly back there and don’t wander around the vehicle or try to get into the front seat with me.
I’ve always been in a quandary about securing my dogs in the car: I always want to do what’s best for my dogs. But with my setup, there doesn’t really seem to be a right answer. Which is why I’ve done nothing.
So when I saw an article in The Wall Street Journal about actual scientific testing of dog harnesses and restraints, it got my attention. Apparently there’s a nonprofit organization dedicated to pet safety (aptly named Center for Pet Safety) and they’ve teamed up with auto maker Subaru (a very dog-friendly company who considers dog owners a large and prime market) to test pet restraints. They hope to determine which restraints work well enough to earn approval ratings from pet-advocacy groups.
This type of testing — as it applies to dogs — is in it’s infancy. I don’t know of any group doing this — although the need is obvious (with almost 90% of pet owners traveling with their pets). The testers are using some crash-test dogs to test how well those harnesses hold up under simulated crash conditions.
The crash-test dummy dogs simulate a terrier (about 25 pounds), a border collie (about 45 pounds), and a golden retriever (about 75 pounds). What? No Great Danes? Schooner demands that giant breeds gain inclusion in these tests!
In any event, the tests were both disappointing and alarming. Of the seven harnesess tested, only one harness (Sleepypod’s Clickit three-point harness) consistently kept a dog safe in a crash. So, is there a right answer? I think we need a lot more testing and hopefully the pet manufacturer’s will put some muscle behind their products so we know that our pets will be safe when properly restrained.
Your turn: Do you restrain your dog in the car? How? If not, where does your dog ride?
We do! Batty rides in a doggie car seat, in the back safely away from airbags. She can see out the window and is restrained with a full harness. Would it stand up in a severe accident, I doubt it. But, it’s better than her going through the windshield at 60mph! She WOULD prefer though, I know, to ride in my lap 🙂
Yes, we do. We have a little shihtzu. We have a doggy carrier for her. I either put it on the floor between the front and back seats, or I put it on the back seat with the seat belt through the handle.
I do, and I have a Honda Element. I have 3 dogs–a 40 lb. mixed breed, a 55 lb. lab, and a 58 lb. aussie. They each wear a Premier Sure-fit harness. I attach 2 tether straps (either with a clip or a slip knot) around the 2 metal bars that the Element’s rear seats would attach to if the seats were in place. The 3rd tether is attached to one of the rings in front of the rear door. I clip the straps to the rings on the underside of the harnesses(short strap) or the ring on the back of the harness (longer strap).
I understand what you’re saying about being hit by a projectile dog in case of a crash. But I’ve heard far too often about terrified dogs bolting from a crashed vehicle, either when a door springs open or when rescue people open the door to assist the driver. There’s a search underway near Williamsburg, VA now for an unrestrained dog who escaped and fled following an accident.
We restrain our dogs for two reasons:
A: They’re wanderers. It’s night to impossible to get them to sit the heck still. They’re constant pushing into the lap of the driver and trying to scale the dashboard is dangerous and distracting *at best*.
B: Felix has crappy recall (despite 6 darn years of work). In a crash, he would run. He would run fast and far and he would not look back. Over the years, as new research has been released, we’ve always changed to the latest & greatest restraint system to make it as safe as possible. We don’t have the brace bars needed for the Sleepypod (dang it), plus we switch vehicles a lot (travelling with family and friends) so a system that relies on special installation isn’t ideal for us, but we have the RC Pets harness that while it failed for a large dogs is still within the safe range for small dogs. (Thank Goodness)
Haha, yes, I think Batty would definitely prefer your lap, Erin! I think as the research develops, we’ll have more good choices for restraints. When I think about people not wearing seat belts, it makes me nervous. So why aren’t I just as proactive with my dogs. I need to be and I hope the technology catches up quickly so I have some options for my cargo area. Woofs to sweet Batty!
Judy, thanks for the comment. I really like the sturdy carriers for the dogs. I think your stowing areas are good ones. Those little guys could get hurt so easily — glad to hear you’ve got her in a carrier.
Carolyn, another Element owner! I love that thing. That’s definitely another worry of mine: what happens to the dogs *after* the crash. I do make sure all my guys have their collars on when we’re in the car (other than that, they’re collarless). It would be sheer hell to have a lost dog… Your tethering idea sounds really good. I need to draw it out to really understand it, but I think I get the gist of it — great idea! And thanks for sharing.
Jodi, Felix and Kol are so well taken care of! Thank goodness my guys are too big to fit in my lap. Or else, I’m sure they’d prefer to sit there, too! I know what you mean about needing a system that is flexible. We change cars sometimes, too, and that can be a limiting factor to the restraint systems that work for us. When we have a new service pup in training, they do start out in a crate. They’re just too little, too mobile, too fast (and not housetrained!) to be left wandering around in the car. But they grow so danged quick and then I’m in my quandary of moving crates, or having a projectile crate in the car… Sigh. It’s not easy to be a protective and proactive dog guardian sometimes! Thanks for stopping in! Woofs to the pups!
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Hi Laurie,
I just found this harness that apparently passed crash testing…might be worth a try.
http://sleepypod.com/clickit
Emily