Hamburg  - Heike Bork was able to rescue herself - and her letters - by running screaming to her car when the German shepherd suddenly tore loose from its line.

"He was just lying there peacefully when I stopped at the letter box," said the 43-year-old postwoman, adding that since the incident fear has accompanied her on her rounds.

Germany's mail carriers do indeed live dangerously: About 600 of them annually suffer such serious injuries when attacked by dogs that they must take a day, sometimes even a week, off work.

Joerg Ulbricht wants to eliminate their fear of canines. He is a dog trainer who offers special training to Germany's 80,000 postmen and postwomen. Ulbricht travelled to Frankfurt an der Oder on Germany's eastern border with Poland to give Bork and about 50 of her colleagues tips on how they should react to aggressive dogs.

"It isn't predominantly the uniform that makes some dogs go at the mail carrier," Ulbricht said. "Every day, the same ritual, every day the same car, every day the same hectic response. As a result the dog's predatory reflex is activated." Therefore, his advice is to use "calm, tight movements and never start a long conversation with the dog."

It's also wrong to pretend to hypnotize the dog and back away slowly. The latter led to a tragic case of a dog attack in 2003 on a postal worker in eastern Germany. Two dogs in a yard attacked a 40-year-old letter carrier, biting her in the face, neck and legs.

The 75-year-old owner of the dogs could not stop the raging animals. By the time his wife was able to lock up the dogs, the letter carrier had suffered severe injuries. What led to the dramatic attack?

"The letter carrier wanted to carefully back away and that's when the animals descended on her," Ulbricht told the horrified letter carriers assembled at the Frankfurt an der Oder postal distribution centre.

Ulbricht said a basic rule is that when a beware-of-dog warning is posted on a fence, the postal worker enters at his own risk. And when it's not possible to securely reach the mailbox, then there won't be any delivery.

In order to avoid another precarious situation Bork always carries a doggie treat for emergencies, although her employer doesn't like it.

"Dog treats are not allowed on the job because dog owners do not necessarily agree," said Karin Fischer, director of the postal distribution centre in Frankfurt an der Oder. However, Rolf Schulz, a spokesman for the postal service, expressed a different opinion.

"We close one eye if the carrier has made an arrangement with the dog owner," said Schulz.

In the end it's about the security of the letter carrier, who should never rely on the well-known conciliatory statement of dog owners - "He won't do anything." Ulbricht stresses this, adding, "It isn't possible for a layman to correctly assess a dog." All alarm bells should go off, for example, when a dog appears completely cool.

And Uzz, the German shepherd, looked at the mail carriers calmly. He wagged his tail and appeared entirely content. But when Ulbricht pulled out a jute bag, the dog bit it for several minutes as if he was out of his mind. It could have been the calf of a postal worker. (dpa)