Lots of Patients...Trouble with Twins (pt. 2 of 3)

Once again, Isaac Rogers was on the other end of the camera capturing our awesome MAF-PalangkaRaya team in action.  Not long ago, Aaron Hoffmann returned with a woman having trouble delivering twins.  She had already delivered the first baby, but the second baby was having trouble and was unable to be delivered in her interior village.

These type of patients require a lot more help to get out of the airplane than the little girl in my previous post.  Thankfully, we've all done this enough times, it usually goes pretty smoothly.

Once she is on the stretcher, we gather around and take her up the dock bridge to the awaiting ambulance.

Making the transition from our stretcher to the ambulance stretcher is always interesting.  It seems like this is done differently every time due to many things.

Thankfully, she was soon loaded onto the ambulance and taken to the nearby hospital.  I heard afterward that unfortunately the second baby was delivered stillborn, an unfortunate reality to some of the challenges facing complex medical situations here.

From the Logbook...Lots of Patients (pt. 1 of 3)

A while back, colleague Isaac Rogers took a bunch of photos of me returning with a young little girl that was super sick.

I can't recall what they thought she was sick with, but she was in a bad state. 

Usually after I pull into the airplane slip at our dock, I tend to stand back and let the family or medical professionals take over.  This time there was none of that, so I just picked the little gal up and took her to the awaiting car.

I was waiting here for someone to come and get the IV from on top of the girl so that it wouldn't get tangled with her needle and hoses as she was placed into the car.  I'd say half of our patients are transported to a hospital in an ambulance, and the other half in a family members car.  (thanks Isaac for the pictures!)

From the Logbook...Flying the Governor

One of our passengers was recently the Governor of Central Kalimantan, the province where we live.  He was a delightful man and fun to speak with.  We flew him to an event occurring about an hours flight from PalangkaRaya and then a few hours later we returned to pick him and his team back up.  Hopefully we will be able to serve the Governor and his office even more in the future.

River Treasure

Upon arriving at work a few weeks ago, one of our night guards, Yanto, had kept his fishing net busy in the wee hours of the morning.

He hauled up this bizarre transparent and blue shrimp.  I had never seen anything like it, and even our other local guys have rarely seen one so big.

Through his semi-transparent exoskeleton you could see his lungs working as well as his heart.

I'll need to keep having my camera ready because Yanto already has a reputation of hauling out some weird creatures from the river.  It amazes me how many different species of animals that live in the river.  Anybody want to go tubing?

From the Logbook...Electricity for Marikoi

A while back I flew an airplane full of cargo to an interior village called Tumbang Marikoi.  One of the items stuffed among all of the other boxes was a new generator.

Something as simple as a gas powered generator can literally be a life changer to some of the communities we serve that don't have any other source of electrical power.

Flying the generator was easy.  Hauling it 20 feet up the river bank was the hard part.  Thankfully, like always, there were some helpful hands awaiting me at the dock.

The generator was immediately taken to its spot and put to use, powering various facilities for two German nurses that have served in Marikoi for over 30 years.

MAF PalangkaRaya Team Photo 2013

We've been trying for some time now to get all the stars aligned right to take a fresh team picture of our MAF crew in PalangkaRaya.  Finally, about a month ago it all worked out for us to get together. (Back Row, Lt to Rt: Isaac Rogers, Sean Cannon, Aaron Hoffmann. Front Row, Lt to Rt: Sugianto, Ogasto, Agus, Abet Nego, Robi.)

Of course, picture time at our place wouldn't be complete if there wasn't a fair share of goofing off thrown into the mix...

In case we can't serve you with our flying, we can be hired for security detail.  We are complete in both Eastern and Western styles of fighting!

I have the privilege of leading a great team.  Together we are able to overcome many different types of challenges and obstacles while at the same time using our giftings to serve those that live in some of Earth's most isolated and hard to reach places.