Sept. 19, 2005 — An animal welfare group warned Friday that time was running out for pets abandoned in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, estimating that tens of thousands of animals had already died.

The Humane Society appealed for Louisiana state authorities and federal officials to intervene to ensure that any animals abandoned when residents fled New Orleans more than two weeks ago be rounded up and sent to rescue centers.

Wayne Pacelle, the president and CEO of the U.S. society, said that while some 5,000 animals had been rescued, "there are many more failures than successes."

"It is a critical situation now. These animals have an incredible will to live, tens of thousands of them are still out there alive, in homes, roaming the streets," he said, warning that time was running out.

"We have literally now just a few days left," he told journalists in the state capital, Baton Rouge. He said that while animal welfare workers had been working around the clock, they were up against an overwhelming challenge.

"We are not big enough to handle the magnitude of this crisis," he said, adding that the pace of recovery had already sealed the fate of many pets.

"I'm afraid that because it's been so slow in happening, thousands of animals have already perished." Asked for an estimated toll of the number of domestic animals who may have died, he said: "Certainly tens of thousands."

"We want a policy to say that local, state and federal responders should actively assist animal rescue," he said. "We need a swift and decisive declaration."

Pacelle said the group estimated that some 50,000 animals were abandoned in households when the hurricane struck and that thousands had inevitably died.

Major Ed Bush from the Louisiana National Guard, which rescued thousands of people and animals from the floodwaters that engulfed New Orleans after Katrina struck on Aug. 29, said that he was unaware of any official policy on rescuing animals from the disaster zone.

"From day one, our priority has been saving lives and getting as many people out as fast as we possibly could,” he said. “Our number one priority has always been to save human life."

He said that troops were authorized to destroy dogs that were found to be interfering with human bodies left on the streets as floodwaters from Hurricane Katrina receded.