Jim Manley claims two professional passions - flying and writing. He flew instruction, air taxi and air-attack for the US Forest Service before joining MAF. Then he served 17 years in Ecuador as a pilot, radio tech and program manager. He’s also published numerous articles and his first book, Call For News, came off the presses in Dec 2010.
I first saw it on a winter day. We sat in the Cessna 172 cockpit, 1,000 feet above a white ridge. The propeller pulled us through sub-freezing air, the heater warming my student in shirtsleeves, me in pilot’s uniform. Sierra Nevada Mountains rose before us, gray granite pushing up through thick snow spiced with dark […]
Every pilot carries a bag. Some big, stuffed. Others small, concise. As an instructor, I carried headset, ear plugs, sun glasses, local chart, lesson plan, small paper tablet, and pen. As an air taxi pilot, I ditched the lesson plan, but added more charts, a flashlight, flight calculator, Bible, and lunch. For the Forest Service, […]
Piper AE-1 somewhere in Mexico. Photo credit: Jim Lomheim
Aviation ranks as one of the most conservative activities on the planet. In the beginning, all flights were experiments. Enough succeeded to encourage more tries, but crashing got old. Surviving aviators developed a fondness for doing what they knew would work over what they thought […]
Ecuador program pilots Daniel Soría (left) and Chad Irwin during the ferry flight from Nampa, ID to Shell, Ecuador. Photo courtesy of Chad Irwin.
Each of us pilots has our own secret gulp moment. A time when, despite training, diligence, and confidence, a voice in the back of our head brays, “Are you sure […]
In almost 70 years of service, MAF has gained a worldwide reputation as a First Responder.
The call came at a bad time. We’d loaded the airplane and buckled in three passengers. I was just climbing into the cockpit.
Pancho hurried up. “Capitán, emergency in Bufeo! Snake bite. Pregnant woman.”
I stopped mid-climb. “How long?”
“Two, maybe […]
I was MAF’s Ecuador Program Manager stationed in the Andean mountain city of Quito when a mission director asked for a special flight. Two days earlier he sent a large team down into Ecuador’s costal jungle to minister in a small town. “But,” he explained, “a government official summoned us to a critical meeting tomorrow […]