I can see the look of wonder in Nteboheleng’s eyes. She is gazing over her country, a view she has never before seen in her 16 years. From our vantage point of 11,500 feet, I point out different places she might know. Each one brings a smile and sometimes a giggle in excitement. She has […]
MAF pilot Justin Honaker retells the events of one particular afternoon and a flight where timing was everything.
2:45 p.m. I’m the only MAF pilot flying in Lesotho today, Friday, June 1. My passenger is not here yet, even though he insisted we make a special trip for him. I’m annoyed, but with the schedule otherwise […]
“The weather is still quite good here and I’d like to pick up the patient,” I relay my intensions to home base, nearly 60 miles away in much poorer weather. “Send fuel when the weather clears,” I add, not being thrilled at the thought of spending the night away from home, but willing if it […]
When MAF pilots make medical evacuation flights they don’t always get to see the happy endings. But when they do, it’s a satisfying flight.
MAF pilot Justin Honaker was closing the rear cargo door before embarking on his first flight of the day to the village of Methaleneng in Lesotho, Africa, when a vaguely familiar face […]
From my low altitude I can see nearly every detail of the surface below. Ordinarily, I would be comfortably cruising thousands of feet above Lesotho’s extremely mountainous landscape. But today I’m forced to fly beneath an ominous gray cloud layer, in the middle of thick haze, twisting and turning with the contours of the jagged […]
Yesterday was December 7th, Pearl Harbor Day. Having served in the military and stationed in Hawaii, it is hard for me not to remember December 7, 1941. More than 300 airplanes were used in the attack that catapulted the United States into war that day.
On December 1st, World AIDS day Lesotho, we were reminded that […]