Manda Vanhorne, Chief Trainer

As the Chief Trainer, Manda Vanhorne is responsible for the daily management of all canine training ensuring that the overall scope, schedule and performance requirements for contract and commercial efforts are met.

Manda joined the British Army in 2001 and upon completion of Basic Training was posted to the Defense Animal Center, Melton Mowbray to attend Dog Trainer and Instructor School. During her career as a Dog Trainer in the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, Manda completed two deployments to Iraq and one deployment to Afghanistan training and handling multiple Military Working Dogs, to include Patrol, Combat Tracker and Explosive Detection Dogs.

In the spring of 2008, Manda left the British Army and moved to the United States to join a small team of British Subject Matter Experts working alongside the US Military to develop the Specialized Search Dog (SSD) Program at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.

Manda moved to North Carolina in 2010 to instruct the US Army Combat Tracker Dog Handler Course at K2’s Canine Training Center, and later became a Trainer, imprinting canines on explosives for the US Marines Improvised Explosive Detection Dog (IDD) Program.

After moving to Fort Benning, Georgia and Fort Campbell, Kentucky with her husband, who currently serves in the US Army, Manda returned to K2 in the summer of 2018. Manda continued her work as a Trainer, and also became an Instructor for the Person-Borne Explosive Detection Canine Program. In 2020, Manda became the Chief Trainer, overseeing all of K2’s canine training programs and canine training personnel.

Manda currently lives in Pinehurst, North Carolina with her husband and their two sons – Charlie, 8 and Wolfe, 4.