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Practical information – Good to know
We’ve put together some important information for you concerning your cats and dogs.
The information hasn’t been checked by specialists, so if you are in any doubt, ACL advises you to talk to your vet as soon as possible.
Safe transport for your pet
You need to take a few precautions when transporting your pet by car. The journey needs to be safe and stress-free for both pet and passengers. There are several types of restraint options for dogs. 19 products tested. Keen to provide readers with some advice, ACL took part in a test run by its Swiss partner club TCS, covering 19 products for transporting dogs by car: 6 harnesses, 2 metal cages, 2 plastic crates, 2 fabric ones and 7 metal ones. Result: only the metal crates provide enough safety for dogs and people. Securing your dog properly can be vital as, if you are in a collision at 50 km/hr, a dog weighing 19 kg can acquire a momentum equivalent to 1,000 kg, making it a potentially fatal projectile for the front passengers.
The test
The test covered a number of different aspects to check whether all of the transport options are actually effective. They were evaluated and graded for safety, suitability for dogs, handling and ease of cleaning. To ensure that the results were as meaningful as possible, the testers staged several road collision tests with specially made dummy dogs.
Results
If you want to transport a dog by car as safely as possible, there is only one option: a metal crate. Of all the products tested, only the seven metal crates were graded “excellent” or “highly recommended”. Both plastic crates obtained good results, especially for maintenance and cleaning. Suitability for dogs is also close to the level for metal crates. But plastic is not as good as metal when it comes to safety. Metal cages are only recommended subject to a number of caveats. Their excellent aeration puts them ahead of all the other products, but this is their only positive feature. Their various corners and sharp points risk injuring the dog in case of impact. Due to their design, fabric crates don’t provide sufficient safety either.
The safety harnesses were the biggest losers in the testing. All six products examined failed the collision tests. Two models gained two stars but the other four totally failed, gaining just one star.