Mars inc.
A Legacy of Life-Saving Support
From world-class training facilities to elite deployment readiness, MARS, Incorporated makes our mission possible.
Building the Foundation of Readiness
Since 2020, the extraordinary generosity of MARS, Incorporated has served as a foundational pillar for our team. Their massive contributions have completely reshaped how our canine search teams train, adapt, and respond to real-world disasters.
Completed in 2023, the K9 Agility & Search Area represents a massive, multi-year transformation that began when our partnership with MARS, Incorporated first launched.
Before this project, our canine teams lacked a dedicated, complex simulation terrain at our Del Valle Regional Training Center. Recognizing this gap in regional disaster readiness, MARS stepped forward to completely fund the design and construction of this state-of-the-art habitat with an incredible investment of over $300,000.
Because of MARS’s dedication to working dogs, our teams don’t just train—they master the exact physical conditions they will face on local, national, and international disaster deployments.
Advancing Deployment Readiness:
2025 MARS Training Grant
NorCal Disaster Training
Thanks to the grant provided by the MARS Inc., our organization successfully sponsored eight (8) of our elite canine search teams to attend the intensive 2026 NorCal Disaster Training workshop.
Hosted annually by the HD Search Dog Fund, this premier four-day workshop is specifically engineered to test the limits of canine search teams under realistic deployment scenarios.
Utilizing the highly specialized tactical training sites of California Task Force 3 (CA-TF3), California Task Force 4 (CA-TF4), and California Task Force 7 (CA-TF7), the intensive event embeds both Live-Find and Human Remains Detection (HRD) teams into hyper-realistic disaster environments. This grueling, fast-moving deployment simulation forces handlers and canines to adapt and work fluidly across three completely different geographic locations—replicating the exact unpredictable conditions they will face on real-world missions.
K9 Medical Simulator
Through the 2025 MARS Inc. Training Grant, our organization was able to achieved a historic milestone for disaster response readiness. We successfully procured and donated a state-of-the-art North American Rescue K9 Medical Simulator directly to the Los Angeles County Fire Department’s Canine Search Team. With this targeted donation, the canine search team—a primary asset of California Task Force 2 (CA-TF2)—becomes the very first FEMA Canine Search Team in the nation to possess a high-fidelity K9 trauma simulator.
Memphis HRD Open Training
The final component of the 2025 MARS Inc. Training Grant was strategically deployed to sponsor four of our elite Human Remains Detection (HRD) canine search teams to attend the annual HRD Open Training workshop hosted by the USAR Foundation in Memphis, TN.
This intensive, two-day advanced course is designed to push recovery assets to the absolute limit of technical competency. The 2026 workshop focused on data-driven scenario replications that specifically mimicked the zero-visibility hazards and extreme flood conditions seen in Texas following the severe weather events of July 4, 2025.
