Mercy Air recently flew another MAF/Flying for Life trip to Tshikondeni in
the Limpopo province. On this occasion, the plane was full and one of
the passengers was Jeremy Boddington, a retired Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm
helicopter pilot who, together with his wife, are looking at joining
Mercy Air soon. We will let him tell the story of the day:
"Recently arrived from the UK, my wife,
Janet, and I are starting as short-term volunteers with Mercy Air.
What better way to get a feel for the work,
than to accompany Paul Middleton on a flight to the dry and arid Limpopo
region of northern South Africa, taking a team of dentists to a village
day clinic?
We left before sunrise, using torches to
pre-flight the Kodiak in the dark. As Paul powered the aircraft down the
Mercy Air strip,
I wondered whether we were going to miss the trees at the end of the
runway and
how many Mercy Air staff had been woken from their slumbers. The Kodiak
however has excellent short field performance and we were airborne about
half way down the 600m long strip.
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| Loading passengers and supplies in Jhb |
We arrived into Johannesburg at 06:30 to collect the
dentistry team and then flew another 1h45 on to Limpopo, landing on a
bumpy dirt strip before 9am.
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| Tshikondeni is an old coal mine airstrip that we can still use |
This saved the team a six hour drive that in reality could easily have taken nearer eight - each way!
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| Google Maps depiction of the journey by road |
From the airstrip there followed a one hour
rickety minibus ride, with frequent stops for the driver to release smoking seized
brakes. On arrival at the clinic, a
mobile dentistry van and a number of patients awaited us, sitting in a line on the
concrete step.
They seemed most grateful to see us as, over the next few hours, pain and aches were
removed.
Dentistry done, we moved on to a day centre
for disabled adults, started by a local Christian lady some years ago. Delivering
new shoes, food and other supplies, we enjoyed a time of talking and hearing
about some of the ‘students’ and how the centre freed up caring families to get
out to work to earn a living. After a time of fellowship, singing and prayer,
we said our goodbyes, hugs and some tears in evidence.
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| At the dissability centre |
The return journey was quieter (our exhausted
passengers were asleep), and after dropping them off in Jo'burg, we made it back to our short unlit grass airstrip
with about 10 minutes of light to spare. Night falls fast in Africa."
Thank you
Paul and Jeremy for the Mercy Air team
