Aibai Airstrip: Travel Update #16

The plan

Thomas and Jonathan Rodgers are preparing for
a 3-week mission trip this August 7-28

to Papua New Guinea (a small island located north of Australia).

The brothers will be working with some heavy equipment the Lord has miraculously provided to finish installing a runway on the side of a mountain at the missionary compound in Aibai, PNG. Aibai is a small village where our friends the Mike Berbin family and a team of other missionaries lead medical, educational, and church ministries.

Both Jonathan and Thomas have experience using such heavy equipment; Jonathan owned a large landscaping company for a number of years, before entering the ministry himself in North Carolina. Thomas learned to operate the equipment while working for Jonathan, and has gone on to use bobcats and bulldozers frequently with his own renovation and property maintenance business. While the runway in Aibai has been "started", it needs to be graded, extended, and then topped with soil from another property to encourage a grass surface and prevent washout.

(the airstrip is located to the left of the Aibai mission compound; note the goats and man standing on the near end of the large airstrip, and the washout lines currently crossing the property)

It will take the men all of their 2.5 weeks on the ground to complete the task, and hopefully will allow the Berbins to see the answer to 15 years of work and prayer, when they fly in and land on the new airstrip. For the first time they will be able to avoid the hazardous road trip to the village when they travel back to Aibai early this fall after their current furlough in the US.

the current method of reaching the Aibai village:
a hazardous mountain trip over washed-out roads

and precarious bridges, through areas favored by theives;
this trip takes 6-8 hours *on a good day*.

The trip is highlighted by the raw beauty of the Papua New Guinea mountains.

How can you help?

Please pray!

-for Thomas and Jonathan to have safety as they travel and work

-for the equipment to work efficiently (no breakdowns!) during the short time alotted for the trip

-for preaching opportunities while the brothers are there - teaching the gospel to some who've never heard

-for safety of their wives and children staying behind in the States

-for financial provision - each brother is raising $4500 to cover trip expenses

Want more information? Email us

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Travel Update #16 - Long, Long Days

SATURDAY, AUGUST 21 - As I sit here writing this update, the sun has already set, a beautiful nearly-full moon has risen overhead and Jon is still out on the dozer! He has been working hard since 7am (it's now 7pm) and he shows no sign of stopping. The only thing that may stop him is running out of fuel!

He has labored all day to fill in the large washout on the side of the airstrip. The only way to fill this in is to push dirt from a big pile across the airstrip - a distance of over 100 feet! Once he has pushed in a load of dirt he must pack it by rolling over it several times. This will help to keep it from washing away with the coming rainy season. He has also cut a number of diverting drainage ditches that will slow the water runoff from going down the airstrip, and will drain it to the sides before it gets to the old washout area. The work gets very tedious and boring after a couple of hours but Jon has been doing it for more than 12 hours. The new pictures that have come through are from 5 hours ago: at that point he had filled more than 20 feet of the hole and had about another 6-8 feet to go. I'm sure he will not come in until he has completed the job.

I got the lighter job today. I spent the morning precutting 2x3 lumber for the walls of the school building. This will make the construction proceed a bit faster on Monday. Once that was complete I installed beams on the posts (which we installed yesterday) that will carry the floor of the building. Lord willing we will get the floor and walls up by dark Monday evening.

Please pray for our speedy work and our continued saftey,

Thomas and Jon

WOW what a view!

1 comment:

Ruthie said...: I love to see the lady with her child watching Jonathan work. She reminds me of myself with my two boys. Always watching tractors and trucks!; August 21, 2010 at 10:35 PM