Aviation: An elegant solution to complex problems on the mission field.
What would you do with an airplane?
Medical Evacuation Flights
Long-term missionaries have seen it all: broken ankles, chopped off fingers, bullet wounds, and dying children. These are daily realities of living in the Sierra Madre, and it is something on which we can have a direct impact. Providing a means of getting people to intensive care in 30 minutes instead of ten hours means a far better chance of surviving a bad accident.
Missionary Travel
Missionaries who are invested in Mexico for the long haul are very effective at what they do—but they are also constantly investing their time in mundane and dangerous activities like traveling. When town is six hours away, it is a blessing to be the solution people need to shorten these trips down to 20 minutes. It is the difference between being tied up for three days running errands or one.
Transportation of Supplies
Moving cargo around is difficult in the mountains, especially when that cargo is valuable and expensive. Airplanes are already being used for transporting plant sprouts, goats, and seeds. Delicate items such as these are almost impossible to transport in any other way. Mountain roads are simply too rough.
Our Journey to Mission Flying
For the past seven years, I have spent my professional career as a flight instructor and a pilot for a FedEx feeder company. I have enjoyed success and had many good experiences, but God has called our family to the mission field in order to make use my skills as a pilot in service of the spreading of the Gospel.
I have about 3,300 hours of flight time at this point, giving me a significant head start in heading to the mission field. I have experience in small airplanes such as Cessna 172s and Cherokee 151s, as well as Cessna Caravans, ATR 42-202 and 72-212, and most recently, the Cessna Skycourier.
