PCM News: Having a whale of a time

28 October 2010

Having a whale of a time

I'm not long back after three practically back-to-back trips as detailed in 'Upcoming Busy' below. I'll relate the first one here and then the others above.

We have had some Swiss guys give up a lot of time to come and help us at Mercy Air by extending one of the hangers and making and installing some hangar doors. By way of a thank-you, we let them charter us at cost for a long weekend break in Durban. Fortunately there was a seat free so Cathy was able to come along as well.

We obviously went to the beach and watched a lot of people balance on surf boards.

Cathy fancied the idea..

..but seemed to forget the key bit of kit when it came to actually giving it a go.

We went to the aquarium and some a big fish...

..and some very impressive jumping Dolphins.

No trip to the sea side would be complete without a comprehensive harbour tour...

..before a rather cramped taxi ride getting us and our hired surf boards back from whence we came.

We returned to White River late afternoon on the Monday, and 07:00 the following day I was back out again taking a small team and some supplies up to Mercy Air's base in Chimoio in Mozambique. It was quite a big day flying wise (7.5 hrs), but nothing out of the ordinary worth relating in a blog, and nothing really worth taking pictures of.

Paul and Cathy

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A short history of us

Not long after we were married we felt that God had some full time work for us overseas. This initially began with a move to Sheffield in 1992 to work for a Christian management training company. Three years later we felt the Lord's prompting that another change was imminent and this led to a move to Africa where we helped set up a youth program with the Lesotho-Durham link in the capital Maseru. An initial three year commitment turned into four after which the youth work was handed over to the nationals.

Then, after feeling God was moving us into mission flying Paul enrolled at a flying school and completed his South African commercial license with an instrument rating in December 1999.

We moved from Lesotho to White River in South Africa in June of 2003 where we now work with Mercy Air. Mercy Air was borne out of Youth with a Mission (YWAM) and is a sister, although smaller organisation to the more well known Mercy Ships. We are situated near Nelspruit and provide a service to missions and the development/aid community in the southern African region but mainly serve Mozambique.

We operate four aircraft at present - a Quest Kodiak, a Cessna 310 and two Airbus 350 helicopters which are often used for the relief flights.

When not flying Paul is responsible for flight operations and is Mercy Air's Safety Officer.

Cathy, who is a registered Nurse and Midwife works part time at Africa School of Missions which is a bible college preparing missionaries for overseas service. She teaches in their School of Health and is part of a team which visits a number of rural clinics during the week. She is also helps with the hospitality ministry that Mercy Air runs.

Matthew spent four years at Rhodes University in Grahamstown where he studied photo journalism. He has now flown the nest and is living with his wife in Durban. They have a young daughter named Isabella.