Matt and Becki Dillingham

Mercy Ships

On Friday 7th November I was privileged to do a special flight for MAF. On board Alpha-Delta were Jo Lamb from MAF UK, Bert Van den Bosch (our MAF Madagascar programme manager) and Josh Plett, who was the pilot supervising me. We were bound for Toamasina (also known as Tamatave) on the East coast of Madagascar. Just over an hour in the air, or an 8 hour drive on twisty mountain roads. The purpose of this flight was to allow Jo and Bert to visit Mercy Ships (and Josh and I got to tag along too!)

Flying to Toamasina

Mercy Ships are an international hospital charity and their ship 'Africa Mercy' has come to dock in Toamasina for 8 months. They were due to go to Benin but due to the Ebola outbreak, the decision was made for them to come here. Usually the advance Mercy Ship team arrive in the country 5-6 months before the ship, to screen potential patients and make the preparations required. However, due to the sudden change of plan in this case, the team had only 6 weeks to get ready! So they have been using MAF to get around the country, saving them weeks of travel and enabling them to get everything done in time. It has given us the chance to get to know some of the team and support their mission.

Coming in to land at Toamasina

It was a privilege to be able to join them on their ship and hear some of their stories. The ship has over 400 staff from more than 40 nations including Britain. They will provide free medical treatment to Malagasy people. They are able to remove tumours, treat eye problems, carry out dental surgery and procedures such as treat a cleft palate or tongue-tie. The ship opened for life changing surgeries on the 11th November so there were already some children waiting on board for pre-surgery appointments.

Queue waiting to be assessed to see if Mercy Ships can help them

Mercy Ships also support those who can't be treated by giving the patient (or parent) an understanding of their condition and they pray for people who are suffering. Many people come with headaches or minor illnesses that do not require surgery while others come with more conditions that are incurable, like Down's syndrome. It is vitally important that their conditions are diagnosed and potential treatments explained to try and avoid cases where people spend all their money and pin their hopes (time and time again) on treatments that will make no difference.

Africa Mercy

Our visit was short and sweet as we needed to head back to the airport mid-afternoon to make sure we could get back to Tana before the rains start. We are now into rainy season here so after 3pm there are often thunderstorms which last well into the evening. The Cessna 182, which I am flying, is restricted to visual flight rules only here (so we're not allowed to fly into cloud). It is also 'burning season' where local people are burning down sections of the rainforest, clearing the land to grow rice. This is bad news for the rainforest as huge sections are being burnt each year and it doesn't grow back. It is also bad news for the pilots as our viability reduces and it becomes difficult to avoid thunderstorms. It felt a little uncomfortable to see lightening not far from the wing - something I'll have to get used to for the next 4 months!

Burning Season

Photos courtesy of Jo Lamb, MAF UK.