Guest post. via e-mail.
Plane at RD.
We are home safely in RD, but we did have some excitement. Michael flew us in as usual. The plane was completely full but not near the maximum weight. The weather was nice, and Michael landed fine. He stopped about in the middle of the strip. He started to turn around so he could return to the path near our house. Just as he turned, there was a sound of something breaking, and the back of the plane went to the ground. We got out and looked. The metal rod that holds the back wheel had broken in half, and the back of the fuselage was sitting on the ground. Michael said the only thing he could figure was that the pipe was old and was weakened perhaps by rust inside it.
Michael was in a state of shock. MAF has moved so they weren't in Pk
with spare parts or planes to bring anything in to us. Michael was thinking
it could be a week for the part to come from America. Then someone would
have to bring it via Kpg/Sd/RD to get it to us. He was thinking he would be interior for up to two weeks, and the flight program would be down for that time.
We started to think and pray. We turned on the SSB radio to call the Pk
hangar to let them know what had happened and heard two of the MAF pilots
in Tn talking together. Michael asked one of them, our old buddy Stan Unruh, to see if they had the parts he needed to fix it. They did have the rod but no way to get it to us other than a very long and expensive flight.Then, Stan called called MAF in CK and got Darryl (Moody grad that was in Pk for a while). They had a cannibalized rear wheel assembly complete with rod and wheel, and PTL Darryl offered to fly it to us from Palang K, (2 hour flight). The only trouble was that Darryl flies a float plane. At first, they were talking
about air dropping it in RD, but thought it might break even if it
was padded (it was quite heavy). So we decided to try to have him land on
the river. A few years ago, the original MAF float plane pilot had looked
from the air at the river here in RD and decided we would have to
cut down trees on the bank to make it safe. But he had thought the straight
wide stretch at the lower end of CM would work. So we made a plan
to meet Darryl at CM to get the part.
It is the harvest dry season so the river was rather low, but the straight
stretch below CM looked really good as we drove up and down it. We
had Daim and Solo (Soju's boy) with us to help at the rapids. They were in
seventh heaven watching and listening to Michael (he had some kind of hand
held radio, our Sat Pon, and his GPS). He was calling Pk hangar and
Darryl's plane. The sides of the river were filled with canoes of people
watching. Darryl did quite a flashy landing, and then drove up slowly to the
lanting (dock) at the bottom of the village. Everyone was on the bank with their
mouths hanging open watching all of this. Even Yakin was there (waiting for
Apang Murai to come from Sd). Darryl decided to go upriver to take off
right in front of the village instead of our chosen 1 1/2 kilo wide straight
stretch below the village. It was quite a show that won't be forgotten for
some time to come.
the river at CM
We headed up river with the thought perhaps we could still get the plane fixed and Michael make it back home that day. We had to lift the plane and put it up on some crates (it was a lot heavier than I thought.) Then we started to fix it. The part didn't fit perfectly, and we worked and worked in a light rain. Finally, we decided to do a quick job that was good enough for one takeoff and landing to get him home (no cotter pins holding
it in, one side rubber bushing was partially wrecked. By the time we finished our "tikus mbaiki' labuh" (a mouse "fixes" a squash by eating a hole in it) job it was too late to leave, so Michael overnighted with us. This morning he made it in to Pk safely; then, they pulled off the wheel assembly (plus the "stinger" rod) and did the job right. He was back in the air flying today and took the Engelmans home to KR.
the RD airstrip from the air.
We all praised the Lord for his miraculous answers to prayer and for Darryl and MAF and their willingness to help. It looks like the harvest dry season is over as of yesterday because it is raining again tonight Thanks for
praying for us. We are very tired.
[Note: Missionary Moments are stories taken from e-mails sent to me by my parents who have been missionaries for twenty-nine years (twenty-seven of those years on the field) working as church planters in a remote location of the globe.]
