German dog owners sit out New Year’s Eve chaos in airport hotels

Animal welfare organisation warns that noise, the smell of burning and flashing lights are ‘a nightmare’ for animals

As Germans ready to set off more than 40,000 tonnes of pyrotechnics on New Year’s Eve, Anja Gerauer is plotting her escape, hoping to shield her dog Joy from a night of noisy trauma.

Like hundreds of other pet owners, she has checked herself and her canine companion into a hotel near an airport, where a fireworks ban means the chaos will be far away on Wednesday night.

Gerauer, a 56-year-old film-maker living near Frankfurt, still remembers the first New Year’s Eve after she had adopted her mixed-breed dog from a shelter in Romania three years ago.

Read more about safeguarding dogs from fireworks in Germany on Times2.

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