Portland Fire & Rescue introduced the newest member of its team Thursday.
Kiki the yellow Labrador retriever is trained as an arson dog through a State Farm-funded program.
She spent four weeks training with Portland Fire Lt. Jason Andersen back in Maine. He says there are two things that make dogs like her special.
“Number one they love food, most dogs do, but also their drive to what they refer to as hunt. Most Labradors are bird dogs, that's typically what they were born for, they love that using their nose to find things,” said Lt. Andersen. “So, when you combine that with this particular breed of dogs, they tend to be very successful at what they do.” Dogs like Kiki are trained to help investigators determine the source of fires and whether they were intentionally set.