AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) — Drugs, guns, bombs and people: The dogs at the Aurora Police Department are trained to find it all, no matter the situation.

“We're out there. We're out trying to be that resource for patrol, for other agencies, and trying to make it safer for everybody involved,” Sergeant of the K-9 unit for Aurora PD Jeremy McElroy said.

For the first time since 1980, the Aurora Police Department's K-9 unit is fully staffed: Eight dogs for eight officers, all prepared to go out into the field on a variety of cases.

“Just the psychological advantage of the dog being on scene can get a lot of criminals who want to give up without having to fight with the police, without having to injure us, injure themselves, put anybody else in danger,” McElroy said.

These dogs come at no small fee. Mcelroy says the dogs can cost up to $14,000 before training even begins, and then even more to go through training.

“We get a dog with no training. So we do both the apprehension and the odor training, and that consists of about 380 hours on top of the normal police academy and getting experience on the street," Mcelroy said.

The dogs form tight bonds with the officers, giving real meaning to man's best friend.

“We spend more time with these animals than we do with our co-workers, our wives, our children,” K-9 Officer Nicholas Vellani said.

The coworker who goes home with them at the end of the day.

"When I'm at home, you know, the other three days, he's also with me. And so we really rarely ever spend a day apart," Vellani said.