Aibai Airstrip: Travel Update #8: preventing squashed pigs in the sweltering heat

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

Friday, August 13, 2010

Travel Update #8: preventing squashed pigs in the sweltering heat

FRIDAY, AUGUST 13: Well, today got a little hot! I think we got all the way up to 79. I sure hope tomorrow isn't that bad...sure can't get much accomplished in that kind of heat!

I say all of this of course in jest because I know that many of you who are reading this wish it would just get down to 79 overnight! The weather has been tremendous here in Kiari. Some clouds and some sun provide nice working temperatures throughout the entire day.

Today Jon and I got up nice and early with the intent of accomplishing a lot!

I began work on the dozer around 6:45am. There is still a good bit of dirt to move on one section of the airstrip. This is a time consuming process as the only way to move the dirt is by pushing it one blade-full at a time. But I'm not really complaining since I got through 5 sermons in Romans before lunch! It is a lot of fun to be halfway around the world pushing dirt with a bulldozer and listening to Pastor Minnick exposite the Word of God.

While I worked on the dozer Jon continuted to dig holes for the fence that is surrounding the airstrip. This fence is being put in to keep pigs and goats off of the runway. As Randy said, "a 1000 meter fence is a lot less expensive than a plane hitting a pig."

After lunch we shot grade (used a transit to determine the slope and level) on the airstrip and discovered that we had a lot more dirt to move than originally thought. So Jon took over the dozer work and I headed over to continue digging more fence post holes. I used a post hole digger along side of a national man who had another post hole digger. I remember now why I was supposed to bring work gloves. All of the nationals helping with the fence roared with laughter when I yelped at the pain of a popping blister. For some reason they get great delight in seeing me suffer! Well admittedly it may not be from my suffering but from trying to be all manly "white man can do it with out gloves"! I won't be doing that again!

Yesterday one of the younger men was commenting on my funny looking skin. It took me a while to figure out what he was talking about, but eventually I understood and explained to him that what I had was a curse of the white man. When a white man goes to a tropical region and stays out in the sun all day he changes from white to red to brown. He thought that was quite humorous!

Well the sun has been down for 3 hours now. After a nice dinner of potato soup and bread, with oatmeal and raisin cookies for desert, my lack of energy has caught up with me. I think I'll call it a day.

Thanks for all of your prayers

Thomas and Jon

1 comment:

Anonymous said...: thanks so much for the updates:) they are in our prayers...
landmeiers; August 13, 2010 at 11:38 PM