Grounded

On the 18th December I did a flight from Antananarivo to Besalmpy with a team from US AID. I sat by my plane making felt food for Bethan's Christmas present (the glamorous life of a pilot!!) and met a lovely young lady called Sandra. She only spoke Malagasy but was quite happy to chat to me for half an hour and managed to make me understand that she liked my plane, introduce me to her father and leave me with a mango as a gift.
After a few hours, the USAID team returned to continue their journey to Maintirano, where I would leave them and planned to collect them from, a few days later. After completing the fun task of refuelling the plane (sat on the wing with jerry cans) I flew back to Antananarivo. Unfortunately half way home, whilst completing a routine check of the instruments, I noticed a drop in oil pressure. Normally it reads just above the green arc but now it was reading at the bottom of the green. Fortunately, I made it back to our hanger without any further problems.

After landing and talking to Rob, the chief engineer, the aircraft was temporarily grounded pending a test flight. The next morning Rob and the training captain taxied out to check the aircraft. When they taxied back a few minutes later we knew it was bad news - the plane was permanently grounded until the problem could be resolved. As the oil temperature and everything else appeared normal, the obvious conclusion was that there was a problem with the pressure relief valve in the oil filter so a new one was ordered just before Christmas. The new part made it through customs and into the MAF hanger in record time and was fitted before the new year. Unfortunately this did not resolve the problem so the aircraft is still grounded and the engine will now make it's way to France to be overhauled, which could take 2 months.

In the meantime, I have been re-writing the airstrip directory, which is a book of charts showing us important information about the places we land and what the runway and surrounding area looks like. Some of our charts had nothing on them and others were hard to decipher. Here is a before and after photo:

Bethan is also trying to help fix the plane! She has sent in drawings, tea and chocolate to make it feel better and finally resorted to building me a new one!

Christmas in Madagascar

Our first Christmas in Madagascar almost snook up on us without us noticing. Without the shops and radio playing cheesy Christmas songs from November but with warm weather and nesting birds, it didn't feel like the run up to Christmas at all. On the 17th December, we had the MAF staff Christmas party. Previously a work do has involved an evening out with colleagues, having dinner in a nice restaurant but this year it involved games, devotions, speeches and lunch, starting at 9am and over by 3pm!

Staff Christmas Party games

We had fun eating ice creams while doing our Christmas shopping at the 'mall' and stopped off at the souvenir market for some small toys to put in our home-made crackers (that didn't bang but did have hats and jokes) and a new dress for Bethan to wear on the 25th.

I'd really like all these teddies!

Thanks to a visit from Jo at MAF UK in November, we had some imported brown sugar, so Christmas cake and mince pies were on the menu!

Making mince pies

Christmas day arrived and thanks to the enormous fireplace, Father Christmas had no problems getting down the chimney! Bethan, however, was a bit unsure about what to do with her stocking of presents.

 

After a while she got the hang of opening them and enjoyed playing with the contents.

Opening presents

Christmas lunch was a lovely red onion tart (Delia) with the usual roast trimmings - roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, stuffing and carrots. Couldn't find any sprouts in Antananarivo but we didn't really mind about that! All enjoyed outside in the sunshine:

Not our traditional setting for Christmas lunch!

Christmas lunch in Mascar

The afternoon was spent opening presents, talking to family on FaceTime and enjoying the paddling pool. Then in the evening the power went off so a few presents were opened by candle light. Thankfully the power cut was only an hour or two, unlike last years Christmas in the UK when the power was out for 2 days!

Filling up her new paddling pool

Come fly with me, lets fly, lets fly away....

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.

Flying update

Cessna 182 at Mananjary in the South East. This was the first MAF Madagascar flight.

Over the last 6 weeks I have been doing my Flight Orientation Training in Madagascar. The training covered aircraft handling, some tests on air law and weather in Madagascar and some training on how to look after passengers. It has been great to be back up in the air and to be on the final leg of the journey to becoming a MAF pilot. The first week and a half (15 hours of flying) were spent getting to know the Cessna 182. With it's diesel engine and high nose wheel it is a more challenging aircraft to land so quite a bit of time was devoted to flying into different airstrips, getting used to how it handles on finals. There were also a few MAF manuals that needed to be read so that kept me busy between flights!

Northern Madagascar

After completing a base check (where you are assessed on your ability to fly the aircraft in different situations) I moved onto LOFT (Line Orientated Flight Training) which is when I started flying with passengers on board.I learnt some of the routes and became familiar with some of the airports that I will be flying into as well as dealing with passengers, which was completely new to me. This includes loading their baggage, giving them a safety brief and conducting a safe flight. All this training was done in just 5 flights before a 'route check' assessment by the training captain to check whether I was ready to be the Pilot in Command.

Antananarivo

With the route check complete, there is a further 12 hours or 4 days flying (whichever is greater) of supervised flying. This is when I am responsible for the flight and the official Pilot in Command, but another pilot comes along for the flight to help with unfamiliar areas of the country and give assistance with weather patterns that haven't come up in the initial training. I am still doing the supervised flying and really enjoying it. I am remembering more of the check list off by heart and becoming more efficient at doing what needs to be done on the ground in preparation for the flight. This gives me more time to spend chatting with the passengers and it is uplifting to hear about the work they have done or are intending to do once they have left the MAF aircraft. One of these trips was to Toamasina, where Mercy Ships have docked but I'll save that trip for another blog very soon!

Soavinandriamanitra Nature Parc

This weekend we left the city and investigated Soavinandrimanitra Nature Parc. Just 32km away (20 miles) but it took an hour and a half of driving through Tana traffic and then on some dirt roads to get there. It was brilliant and uncomfortable at the same time! We really enjoyed being able to see so many species that are endemic to this island. The poor guide has probably never had such a long tour as Bethan spent forever with each animal (except the snakes, apparently they are not worth her attention). We definitely got our money's worth, entry price 10000Ar, or £2.50 per adult. However all the animals were in small cages and having watched UK zoos striving for better facilities and welfare for their animals it was hard to see. Especially as our guide was keen that we should see all the animals, so insisted on unearthing them from their hiding places or poking them to make them come closer. She even got bitten on one endeavour to convince a creature out of its hiding place.

It was great to get out of the city and see a little of Madagascar's countryside, and Bethan had a very enjoyable 4 hours! It was also fun to see several species of lemurs freely roaming around the park's trees.

Golden Mantella Frog - which our guide gave to us and failed to mention that it excretes toxins!

Heath and Safety is non existent, to the left of this pipe is a 15ft drop which the path follows all the way round the parc.

There were loads of plants with what I assume is Malagasy for 'we were here..'

Trying to persuade this chameleon to eat all the leaves she had found it was on of the highlights of Bethan's day

Tomato Frog

Baron's Painted Mantella Frog

Feeding red bellied lemurs

Mongoose lemur

Mongoose Lemur

View from the park

Driving home

Life in Madagascar

Life here will quickly become normal to us so while things are still new and unfamiliar we thought we would try to give an idea about some of the differences we have found living in Madagascar compared to the UK.

Driving around Tana is slow but whereas traffic in England can be frustrating, it is the norm here so everyone seems quite chilled on the roads. There are people everywhere, walking on the roads or sat by their market stall with children tied on their back or playing quietly in the heat. There is a lot of poverty here and people have hard lives trying to earn a living. There are hundreds of market stalls selling things like fruit, meat (that has been hanging in the sun all day) and a range of car brake disks! Watching street-sellers chase would-be customers down the road trying to sell them paintings or caged birds and watching people on bikes carrying precarious loads means you never get bored while driving here!

We live in a suburb north of Tana called Talamaty and there is one road towards the centre of Tana, which takes you past supermarkets, malls, markets and many restaurants. The MAF hanger at the airport is a 10-minute drive in the opposite direction. There are no road markings or road signs but plenty of Taxi-Be's - minibuses which are crammed full of people. They pull out whenever their last passenger has got on board so you have to watch out for them. You must also look out for "important people" on the roads, who identify themselves by driving with their hazards flashing. I'm not sure who classifies as important but there are a lot of them driving around! Horns are used a lot here, although it is usually to let you know you are being overtaken. Once you get used to the mayhem on the roads and learn to expect the unexpected, its not so bad.

Freshly bleached market vegetables

Shopping takes ages at the moment because everything looks different and is written in French so you don't immediately see what you want (of course, quite often they just don't have it here). And I have Bethan with me so a lot of time is spent returning items back to the shelves that she has decided we need to buy! Every price is mentally divided by 4000 to see if its a reasonable price compared to England. I look forward to the day when I see a price in Ariary and know if its good-value or not. We have found a place where we can get fresh milk so we don't have to use UHT anymore. Also I now know the meaning of "lait cru", which I didn't when I bought some last week. Consequently, I have now learned how to pasteurise milk as a result! When we get home all the fruit and vegetables are bleached in the sink and rinsed with filtered water. Bethan is particularly enjoying the mangos here, which are just coming into season. It is very strange to have had the English summer and now be approaching "spring" here in Madagascar. We've had our first rain in the last few days as its coming to the end of the dry season but its getting hotter as we approach the summer months when there will be a lot of rain.

Washing apples in filter water

Madagascar is known for its diversity of wildlife, with around 75% of its animals found nowhere else in the world. Soon we hope to take a trip into the rainforest where there will be more animals to see than here in the city, although we did see a chameleon in our first week here. I asked our gardener, Dennis if he had seen any interesting creatures in our garden as Bethan likes "minibeasts". So now he brings her whatever he finds. This week it was a praying mantis. We sleep under nets to keep the mosquitoes away and have to make sure we shut all the doors before sunset otherwise they all come into the house. Finding geckos on the wall is still an exciting discovery but cockroaches are not.

Bethan and a praying mantis

We feel very settled in Madagascar and have found a church (Tana City Church) that is English speaking and similar to our home-church in Buckland so we are really pleased about that. It has also helped us meet people here as we adapt to life without our family and friends nearby. Becki has been doing a lot of flying training in the last week and should soon be ready to start taking passengers. We will try to update this blog regularly with stories and photos of some of her first MAF flights.