Pilot's Logbook

Saturday, January 4, 2014

Rains, Planes, and Automobiles

Dave officially started operations in January 2013. Since then, he has flown over 600 hours and 72,000 miles. That is a lot of flying in a single engine aircraft.

Dave's GPS tracks collected over the last year flying in Northern Mozambique

Our program here in Mozambique has two airplanes, a Cessna 206 and a Cessna 210. Dave started out flying the 206, Six-Charlie-Echo, which flies a little slower, but can land on rougher airstrips because of its rugged front tire. This past December, Dave started to transition to flying the 210, Charlie-Mike-Quebec. This plane is similar to the 206 however it has retractable landing gear and therefore flies a bit faster. It is great for the longer flights; however, it is more limited to where it can land. Because it is a Congo registered airplane, Dave had to get a Congolese pilot's license in order to fly it.

The 210 parked in front of the hangar

Another change that came about December was the rainy season. We have not had appreciable rain since last May and the whole city of Nampula has been extremely dry. We don’t receive water at our house so we pay a man to haul water in his truck to our tank every few weeks. Many of the Mozambicans carry heavy buckets of water to their house each day. One of the ladies at our church said she had to walk three times farther than normal to get water.

During the dry season Dave installed a rain collection system so that we could collect water during the rainy season. In the first week of the rainy season, we got about 9 inches of rain…needless to say, our tank runneth over.

Lobo and Charlie posing in front of our tank collecting water off the house

We are thankful for the water but it comes with its own challenges. Weather can complicate the flying schedule. On one recent flight, Dave flew to Tupuito to pick up his passengers and then was not able to return because of a thunderstorm and had an unplanned overnight trip. For those of you that like off-roading, we get to go “mudding” almost every time we leave the house. The roads are in the worst condition during the rainy season and when you are driving in the rain, some of the roads seem more like riverbeds.

A TRIP TO THE U.S.

In late January/ early February, we will be traveling to the U.S. so that Dave can attend a maintenance training class at Headquarters in Idaho. This training is to fulfill requirements that the Mozambican government has of MAF. We will be in the Snyder/Lubbock, Wichita Falls, and San Antonio for a short visit and hope we get to see you!

VEHICLE FUND

We still have no update on court case regarding the car accident. If you would like to donate to our vehicle fund, you can send tax deductible donations to MAF to the following address:

MAF
P.O. Box 47
Nampa, ID 83653

**include a note that says “Holmes Vehicle Project #4976”

Or you can donate on-line at maf.org/holmes (leave a note in the comment section that the donation is for Holmes Vehicle Project #4976).

I recently gave a test at the orphanage for the kids to receive their first rank in Taekwondo (gold belt). I couldn't resist including one of my favorite pictures of Jordão after he passed his test! I don't have belts to give the kids yet but I am hoping to bring some back when we come back from the States.

Saturday, October 12, 2013

Elephants, Accidents, and Photo Ops

We wanted to share with you some of our recent events and photos from here in Northern Mozambique over the last couple of months:

Dave had the opportunity to fly in the Niassa Reserve. One morning before take-off, he actually had to wait for an elephant to get off the runway before he could take off. While he didn’t have his camera ready for that shot, he did get a good picture of some elephants in the reserve from the air.

Can you see the elephants in the bottom left-hand corner?

A week later I got to go on a flight with Dave to bring a missionary, Phil, back to the village of Pebane where he is a part of two missionary families that are teaching the Bible chronologically. The work they are doing is incredible and it was a privilege to fly Phil back in and carry some needed supplies. When we arrived, we needed to wait for the vehicle to arrive before we could unload the airplane. While we were waiting, I asked some of the people who had come up to watch the plane land if I could take some pictures. Once the camera came out, everyone wanted to be in a picture.

Photo op with kids at Pebane

Dave and Phil unload the plane

We often fly to a titanium mine, flying in both doctors and workers associated with the mine. One worker received a head injury and needed to go to the hospital. Seats were removed from the plane and replaced with a stretcher so the man could be flown from the mine to the hospital in Nampula. To travel by car for hours on the bumpy roads would have been much more difficult for a person with a head injury.

Unloading the patient to go to the hospital in Nampula

Our old sign at the hangar was in bad repair and still had MAF’s old logo. When the vision students were here, they removed the old sign (click here to see old sign), sanded it and painted it white. I then painted the new logo on the sign. With some repainting, the new sign went up for a fresh look.

Jill painting the new MAF logo

The new sign in place

Towards the beginning of September, I was returning from the orphanage where I teach martial arts to the kids. Shortly after the turn-off, I drove into a cloud of dust in a construction zone. As I went through the dust, suddenly out of nowhere was a large bus coming straight at me in my lane. We struck head-on, and our Land Rover was totaled. As bad as the accident was, I walked away from the accident with only minor injuries and no one on the bus was injured. In the next week or so, the case will go to court to determine fault. We appreciate your prayers:

That the trial will be corruption free. That the police will give true information to the judge and that the judge will look at it fairly.
That I will be able to understand the questions the lawyers and judges ask and will be able to communicate clearly. That a translator will be allowed if necessary.
That the bus’s insurance company will pay for our vehicle and that we can find a suitable replacement vehicle.


The Land Rover after the accident

We had the chance to show the JESUS Film, the story of the life of Jesus in the village of Namialo, the hometown of the wife our our guard Armando. We invited Alberto, our first language tutor to go with us to show the film. While we have all the equipment, we have not come up with a good frame for the screen yet. In good African fashion, Alberto and some of the men from the village improvised and quickly built a frame out of bamboo with machetes. About 100 people showed up to watch the film.

Building the bamboo frame for the screen

Alberto (in Portuguese) and Armando (in Makua) inviting folks to watch the film

Watching the film after sunset

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Missing Body Parts

Dave & Jill at Lone Creek Falls, South Africa

1st Corinthians 12 talks about the body of Christ…how each part is necessary for the whole to function properly. Have you ever had a broken bone or a sprained ankle? As you hobbled around, you probably found that you couldn’t accomplish as much as when your whole body was in good working order.

The MAF team in Mozambique is small, just three expat families. Each person plays an important role and if they are gone, their absence is felt. We find that we can’t accomplish as much without them. Dave and I experienced this reality upon returning from our trip from South Africa. One family took their vacation after our conference (whereas we took ours before) and the other family returned to the U.S. for a month.

With only one plane and one pilot/mechanic, it was up to Dave to keep the flight schedule going. Immediately, he was faced with some major maintenance. A part was ordered and we were praying that it would come in on time and so that Dave would have time to do the repair work before the next scheduled flight. On top of this, our first day back at the hangar was our scheduler’s last day on the job with MAF. We were hastily trying to learn his job, find out where all the loose ends were, and train someone new to take his place. Because it was the end of the month, all of the bookkeeping needed to be wrapped up at the same time as well.

It was a good experience for us to “man the fort” by ourselves for a bit, but we are glad we don’t have to go it alone all of the time…we were designed to operate as a body!

The first week we were back, Dr. Hanneke along with Jacinto, a Mozambican pastor, decided to show the JESUS film each night of the week in a different village during her week long visit in the Gurue area. Dave was there the first night to help set up and hundreds of people came to watch the story of the life of Jesus.