BUFFALO, N.Y. — New York State Park Police on Thursday afternoon announced that one of their newest K-9s is named after fallen Buffalo firefighter Jason Arno.
Jason Arno's family and colleagues were there Thursday afternoon as K-9 Arno was introduced to everyone at Engine 2 in Buffalo.
K-9 Arno is a German Shepherd from Hungary. He's a year-and-a-half old and lives with Officer Michael Cali and his family. He arrived last week, and Cali and Arno are busy bonding right now before Arno's training starts. He knows his new name and learned it quickly.
They were trying to come up with the new name for the dog and knew Arno was the perfect name.
"The four of us were sitting around, discussing and throwing out all kinds of different names for a suggestion. Then out of the blue, Officer Cali simply said 'Arno.' He said after the Buffalo firefighter Jason Arno who was killed in the line of duty this past March. Everyone kind of just stopped, looked at each other, there was a moment of silence, and Officer Cali just said, yeah, 'I like that,' " NYS Park Police Major Clyde Doty said.
Cali added: "I think he's just really social, friendly, social dog. He's including everybody and that's what we want to see."
The dog will first train in explosive detection with the Chautauqua County Sheriff's Office. Once he's done with that, he will train in patrol tracking and apprehension.
K-9 Arno's training starts September 11, and it will take 16 weeks.