Tag Archives: pilot

High Maintenance

When my husband David puts on his old glasses, I know what that means: aircraft maintenance. In a moment, he’s transformed: off goes the pressed, white pilot shirt with captain’s bars on the shoulders, on goes the plain, blue work shirt with a few holes and the rubbery red RTV stain I can’t get out. […]

When Popping Off is Necessary

When I joined MAF in 1977, the training department was teaching pilots how to execute a “flap pop-off.” This technique allowed the airplane to “unstick” itself and get flying at a very slow speed when trying to take-off from an extremely muddy airstrip…a trick that became quite useful when I flew in Ecuador.

The Amazon […]

Homeward Bound

Waiting to board an MAF flight out of Bunia to Entebbe, on their way to the MAF program in Kinshasa, our resource team encountered this traveler who had a change of heart.

The young man stands in the shade of the wing of the MAF airplane. The airport ramp is hot and dusty. He waits in […]

Bug Off!

Since moving to Papua, I have a new afternoon routine with my kids. It goes like this.

Holsten Child: “Mom, can I go out to play?”

Me: “Sure, but do you have bug spray on?”

Holsten Child assumes the position: arms outstretched, eyes closed, as I cover him/her in a cloud of bug repellant. A […]

Congo Sans Photos

We have a small resource team in Africa for the next few weeks, gathering videos and photos for our upcoming Africa campaign this summer. Videographer Ron Wormser describes a tense and yet somewhat “typical” flight in east DRC.

We were minutes away from landing when we received the radio call from the NGO (non-governmental organization) […]