Pilots N Paws Lands in Duluth, MN
- Rock Rat
- Aug 9
- 3 min read
Updated: Aug 11
Pilots N Paws is an arrangement between small craft pilots and non-profit canine organizations assisting in the speedy transport of dogs across the USA! You can read up about the protocol details on your own time, what you need to know for this post is that their first flight and puppy transfer to Duluth went down yesterday, August 7, 2025. First of many, is the hope!
Thursday lunch breaks are not synonymous with rigorous undertakings- are they? If so, to whom? Do ya'll get sudden and urgent pings raveling out a tome and a half of follow-ups, fill-ins, and assorted verifications at 12:13 on a typically tepid Friday Eve Day?
Such a midday found me twisting the volume knob on my Subie stereo to the right in an attempt at collected nonchalance. My audiobook, 'The Catalpa Rescue,' (highly recommend listening or reading anything by this author if historical adventure fiction rings your bell) three-quarters swam over my work cell's cries for unsafe attention. Seemingly, in heightened distress that I be audacious enough to wiggle my time around to admit any middle-of-the-day shenanigans in case he* (i imagine my company phone to be a palm-sized, demanding male monkey with glue-like clinging fingers and a pull on my attention like an industrial backhoe) should be at liberty to connect me with crew or captain.
There we were, 11 miles south of the home office eating gravel dust instead of protein shake lunching. Two tracks of dried regurgitate from my bloated girl dog flavored the cab with strict breath through your nose reminders and intuition whispered there would be more canine excretions soon added to the menagerie in my personal but also sometimes field rig.
The Venture North airport (really, more of an airstrip but I didn't look up the difference for this post) in Cloquet, MN, blinked "4 min" arrival from the incipient left turn I made at the last lighted intersection en route. Pulling up to the right of a tidy dumpster in seasonal hunter green signage, I swiped the puke off my shorts as I unlocked my screen and read/walked toward the far end of the lot. A North Something Aviators emblem on the chain gate, the strip was an asphalt expanding northwest of the club entrance. I was on a beeline for the lone Cessna beside twin fuel tanks, their white and black and (also hunter green) lines clipped or locked three meters overhead where gleaming porcelain coated gauges looked on.
A leg appeared under a small plane door and soon the rest of pilot Don Hanson with it. There was another storm coming our way, so he had to speed off. The rest is herstory. Pike & Harlow are settled in as foster littles to Bash & Zephyr at home. Special Shout Out to NW MN Aussie Rescue for setting everything up and bringing Pilots N Paws to our area!
If you have questions or interest in the Pilots N Paws program, NW MN Aussie Rescue, adoption of either Pike or Harlow, or whatever else, hit us up.
with love and two foster puppies chewing. on my toes,
Rock Rat
Tori Kay
The Destroyer
VMK
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