New Zealand police shot and killed a young security dog at the Auckland Airport on Friday after it escaped its handler and ran loose for more than three hours on the tarmac, disrupting at least 16 flights.

Many were upset that the dog was killed and some questioned why it couldn’t have been tranquilised. The incident prompted a deluge of angry comments on the airport’s Facebook page.Grizz was being trained to detect explosives by New Zealand’s Aviation Security Service and was about six months from graduating.