This Year's Iditarod Dogs Are Wearing Something Special

The Iditarod, the annual sled dog race celebrating Alaska's official state sport, is set to get underway Saturday with a new focus on safety after five dogs died and eight were injured in collisions with snowmobiles while training on shared, multiuse trails. For the first time, mushers who line up for the ceremonial start in Anchorage will have the chance to snag light-up, neon harnesses or necklaces for their dogs before they begin the dayslong race that takes the dog-and-human sled teams about 1,000 miles over Alaska's unforgiving terrain, per the AP. The 38 mushers will trace a course across two mountain ranges and along the frozen Yukon River and ice-covered Bering Sea. In about 10 days, they'll come off the ice and onto Main Street in the old gold-rush town of Nome for the last push to the finish line.

Mushers have always contended with Alaska's deep winter darkness and whiteout conditions. But the recent dog deaths even while training have put a focus on making the four-legged athletes easier to see at all times. Mushers typically wear a bright headlamp for visibility, but that doesn't protect lead dogs running about 60 feet in front of the sled. "I can't make [snowmobilers] act responsibly," said Dutch Johnson, manager of the August Foundation kennel, which finds homes for retired racing sled dogs. "But I can help make dogs more visible." The August Foundation has since secured an $8,500 grant from the Polaris Foundation and raised another $2,500 to buy 400 light-up harnesses, which were handed out to mushers at sled dog races in Fairbanks and Bethel earlier this winter.

The harnesses burn with bright, neonlike colors that help illuminate the dogs in the darkness of the Alaska winter and pierce the clouds of snow sometimes kicked up by snowmobiles. Johnson will hand out the lighted harnesses Saturday at the Iditarod's ceremonial start in Alaska's biggest city. The race's real start comes Sunday in Willow, about 75 miles north of Anchorage. The dog deaths are the latest pressure point for the Iditarod, which began in 1973 and has taken hits in recent years from the pandemic, climate change, the loss of sponsors, and the retirement of several big-name mushing champions, with few to take their place. More here. (More Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race stories.)