Bringing Your Dog to the TCI

Although pets are generally not permitted at Turtle Breeze, people often ask how difficult it was to get our dog, Naya, permission to enter the TCI.

In a word: difficult.

If you fly commercially, the airlines will not accept your pet without the proper documentation — if at all. If you fly privately, however, you can get yourself into a terrible situation. The bottom line: do not put your pet on a plane or boat without explicit written permission, for the specific date and time of arrival, from the TCI Department of Agriculture veterinarian — currently Dr. Murrell. If you do, your pet will very likely be euthanized on arrival.

With that grave warning given, there is a process you can follow — but you have to really want it. It takes months of visits to your local vet to gather all of the necessary documentation. Once your vet-prepared package (the “Application to Import Cats and Dogs 5269”) is ready, you send it to the USDA for approval before sending it to the TCI; they will not consider your application until the USDA has verified it.

When you finally have everything, you request an arrival date and time by email. They are very specific about it, because Dr. Murrell will be waiting on the tarmac when you open the aircraft door. She is truly wonderful and very helpful — and very serious about the process. There are no corners to cut.

Once you arrive, all is well, right? Not quite. Be prepared to give up a day of your vacation to obtain an export permit to take your dog home. That means a trip to the Department of Agriculture for a coupon and an export application; a trip to the Treasury to pay the coupon; a visit to a local vet (with an appointment, if you can get one) to examine your dog — the same dog examined many times to enter the country just days before; and finally a return to the Department of Agriculture with the application, the vet report and the paid coupon to collect the export permit.

The most frustrating part is that they insist the export permit is required by the US government when you return with your dog. It is not: there is no such requirement to re-enter the US with a pet. You only need proof of rabies vaccination — full stop. It is an unfortunate disconnect between the two governments that creates a lengthy and entirely unnecessary process.

In our case, since we visit Turtle Breeze so often, we felt it was worth it. Here are some photos of Naya enjoying her hard-earned travel privileges. After her second visit she became eligible for a passport — we jumped through those hoops too — and Naya is now the only member of our family with a TCI passport.