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End Of Week

How's this for a really neat looking insect?

Here's what the desk in the Pilots' Office looked like on Monday as I was gathering things fried by Sunday's power surge. Thankfully we were able to have four out of five of our personal thing repaired which had been damaged at the same time.

Not Again

I managed to get some things cleaned up and organized after the mess of the past couple days. I had some surge suppressors sent down from Quito on Tuesday, and put the last of those in place today. I did discover yesterday a bad parallel port (for connecting printers) on Steve's computer, and a bad network adapter on another computer. Then, after the work I did to ground the outlet in our attic for the network hub, I lost another one up there. At 2:30 AM last night lightning must have struck somewhere on the base. The boom was terrific, and I think I lifted a foot off of the bed. Guess that was what did the hub in. So, today I went a step farther, and connected the hub directly to the ground on the outlet, since the hub only has a two-prong plug.

Today there was a few thunder rumbles in the afternoon, and some lightning, but nothing serious. I think that was because it was a much cooler day. It drizzled and rained all day long. A rare day when I was actually cold in Shell. Only one flight completed, and I'm surprised that Fred even managed to get back home again when he did.

Bad Electricity

Sunday we had a insulator (or something else, I'm not sure) short on the power pole right in front of the Nate Saint school. Dustin and I were downstairs playing a video game when we heard a loud pop, then a lot of buzzing. We ran outside to see what happened, and there was a lot of arcing and smoking going on. That lasted for about thirty seconds. I didn't watch it that long, but ran around inside unplugging a couple things, then ran to the hangar to check there. Three of low-voltage lines had dropped to the ground across the school drive, and of course we had no power to the hangar, school, and MAF base houses. By 5 PM a power company truck came by, and checked things out, but nothing was done.

We ran the generator all night for security, since the area was pitch black. Dustin and I went over to the Grant's place to take a shower, as their pump works on the MAF genterator, and the base water system won't work on the generator power. Wouldn't you know it, both propane tanks were empty, and so we had a cold one. I bought new ones Monday, and took care of that. At any rate, since it looked like we might be without power for more than a day (the power company guy told Fred they had bigger emergencies elsewhere) I consulted Dave and we decided to hook up the Grant house to the base water system. At least we'd have water to wash dishes, take short showers, and flush toilet (the Grant's pump isn't has big as the base pump).

I started that job by 9:30 AM, and soon after a power truck showed up with about four guys to repair everything. Well, at least we'd be ready for the next time when I finished the job. I put a one-way valve in the line coming from the Grant's cistern. Had some trouble getting fittings not to leak, but was done with the one way valve by lunch, and that's when the guys were done with the power line repair. Ellyn, the boys, and I went off to La Casona for lunch. We had a nice potato soup and arroz con pollo. When we returned, I found we were still without water, which I didn't think would be the case. Apparently the electromagnetic switch which controls the pump was damaged from the power surge on Sunday. So, I went ahead with the next step and hooked your Grant water system into the base system. That part was easier. Everything works fine with that now, and it's a timely thing, as the base pump wasn't repaired until about noon today. John went into Puyo Monday afternoon looking for parts, and finished the job this morning. I'm glad there are guys like him around who understand electricity.

Now, for more bad news. We lost two TV/VCR combo units, a portable CD player, our stereo, and our DVD player at our house. At the hangar we lost two Epson printers, our HP laser printer, three UPS units, a computer monitor, a surge suppressor, the power supply for the Codan radio (used for radio e-mail), a calculator, and several other small items!!

Then, about 5 PM Monday afternoon a windy storm popped up very quickly, with lots of thunder and lightning. We watched the roof flex up and down, as the wind was just incredible! And, wouldn't you know it, but the power went out again. It was off until about 8 PM and then on all night, until 7 AM this morning. Then it was off again, and I guess they had repairs to make, as by noon the power was back again. Life as been somewhat normal again this afternoon. I lost the BNC port on the hub in our attic, so this afternoon I added a grounded outlet to the attic, something I hadn't had before. With that, and a surge suppressor, I home I won't keep losing hubs in the the attic.

Monday after the big storm I had to go over to the HCJB compound and help Taylor find his lost keys. We found them after a few minutes of looking. Part of the roof on one of their buildings had blown off. Today, as I went for water to Mangayacu, I saw many hangar roofs in town that had huge damage from yesterday's storm.

iBook!!

I forgot to note in here that I have my iBook working again. I made a one-day trip to Quito to have a new logic board installed. Ellyn and Dustin went to Quito that same day for dentist appointments. They left at 5:30 AM, and I followed at 8 AM after getting Taylor off to school. I handed my laptop to the technician at the service center at 1 PM, and returned at 5 PM to pick it up. No charge to me, all parts and labor courtesy of Apple. Thank you very much! Dustin and Ellyn arrived home around 7:30 PM, and I walked in the door about 10:45 PM. What a long day.

Crack, Sizzle, Pop!

After listening to our church tape this morning, we picked up Katie and her three kids, and headed off to Puyo pools. It was a beautiful sunny day, and we wanted to enjoy the slides and waves. They only run the wave pools or the slides at one time, so after the first set of waves was over, we headed to the slides. Well, the wouldn't open the slides because of the nearby thunderstorm which has snuck up. OK, so let's get something to drink and eat. Nope, can't do that either, 'cause they have some large group they are serving. Dustin and I figured that was enough, and headed home on the bus. Ellyn and the others stayed longer, and were later rewarded with the wave pool starting up again.

At home, Dustin and I were playing an Xbox game together. There was some thunderstorm activity going on, but by my reckoning, it was more than a mile away. Sometime around 2 PM, lightning hit a power pole right next to the Nate Saint School. Immediately we knew something was wrong, as after the strike we heard a loud buzzing sound. I sprinted from the house to see a bright light and smoke at the top of the pole. Immediately I ran back in and yelled to Dustin to unplug everything. Turns out that three power lines were down on the ground, right across the school driveway, and the power was out on the MAF base and some neighboring homes. To make a somewhat long story a shorter one, we were big losers today. We lost two TV/VCR units, a portable CD player, stereo, and DVD player. All plugged into the same two outlets, none of them on a surge suppressor. My Bad!! Thankfully our computers weren't damaged.

The power is still out tonight, and I am writing this to the hum of the diesel generator which is powering the base and the hangar. We are without water, as the three-phase pump doesn't work with the generator. Tomorrow I'll work on connecting the water system at the Grant's house to our base system. Then we will be able to use the two-phase pump at their house to supply water to the base. I don't hole out a lot of hope that the power company will fix the problem tomorrow, and it will be a long day if we don't have water. A couple guys from the power company stopped by at 5 PM, and now they are aware of the problem. But, he said they have bigger emergencies to take care of.

Avgas Delivery

A truck is delivering fuel as I type. That's the good news. Bad news is that it was supposed to be a delivery of 2000 gallons, and we're only getting 1300. Actually we're supposed to be getting 6000 gallons, and the delivery was to be in two parts, 2000 gallons and 4000 gallons. Pray that the delivery of the second amount will be closer to what we have ordered, and that it will arrive soon. The six MAF aircraft in Ecuador burn about 900 gallons of avgas a week.

Lucio Loses?

President Lucio Gutierrez's ruling party has not fared well in the elections. His political party may be disolved if it doesn't received five percent of the vote. As of today, it looks like the Patriotic Society may not have the necessary votes to stay alive.

VOA article: Election Results Threaten Ecuador's Ruling Party

Houston Chronicle article: Ecuador governing party losing in local elections

Low Avgas

Please pray for our avgas situation here. We're down to under 1500 gallons in our tanks. We were supposed to recieve a shipment on Saturday, but it didn't arrive. The supply has become unstable in recent months. There is only one supplier in the country, and the cost has increased 9% in the past several months. Please pray that the truckload of fuel would arrive immediately, and that we will not have to cut back our operations.

Bargain Basement

Awesome! I bought five new Netgear 4-port hubs with BNC connectors. They are the kind that I currently use in the houses on the MAF base, and they aren't made anymore, so can be hard to find. I haven't been able to find them for sale online for months now. Of course, since One went bad on Saturday, I went shopping again today, and found someone who had ten for sale. I bought five of them, at an average price of $13.80 and that's a good deal. It looks like I even have a hand-carry to bring them down in a month. Perfect timing!

Damaged Electronics

Saturday while Dustin and I were on that trip over to the Anzu, there was a lightning storm in Shell. I lost a network hub and an wireless access point in our attic. Actually, only the BNC connector on the hub was damaged, and I was able to swap the hub with one in the McCleery's attic to get things going again. But, the wireless access point I had to replace. Fortunately I had a spare one. Today I will be doing some shopping online to find some replacements. The problem is that money is tight right now for the program. We make up a budget each year, but it is dependent on flight revenue. We have been flying less hours lately than projected, therefore we don't have as much money as we had planned on. The belt is quite tight right now.

Kayak Practice

Sunday we went to Puyo Pools after church. They have built a nice new water park, with a wave pool, and two big slides. It's very impressive, and today was my first time there. I took some photos, and I'll have to get a couple of them up on the web site. After that, Dustin and I took the kayaks up to the dique, the little swimming hole on the Rio Tigre in Mera. It's a good place for us to practice a few strokes and our rolls. Dustin is finally able to roll the boat consistantly. Next is for us to be able to roll when we are in rapids and get flipped over.

We were on the Misahuali a couple weeks ago, and when I flipped over in white water, I had to do a wet water exit. I even blew it in that I let go of my paddle, something you should never do. Something about being upside down in a kayak--you forget to think about anything but air! We are slowly learning. Saturday we went on a two-hour round trip over to the upper Rio Anzu, to see if that river was anything we could practice on. It turned out that it wasn't very big at all, and there are a couple places much closer to home that we can use.

Election Process

Somebody is happy about the election results! There is a stream of cars and buses going up the main road through shell, horns honking, people yelling. It's 11 PM, and it's been going on for fifteen minutes now. You can find out more about the elections process here. Most interesting thing here is that voting is compulsory.

Off The Precipice

One more reason why bus travel in Ecuador is something to be feared. Ellyn, Dustin, and I all need to make a bus trip to Quito this week...

Bus falls off precipice leaving five dead, 35 injured 17/10/2004

The Red Cross said the authorities were investigating the cause of the accident, without revealing the conditions of those injured.

Ecuadorian Elections

News item:

International observers to monitor Ecuadorian elections

The observers come from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Canada, United States, Spain and Japan.

Hangar Happenings

Dan aborted a take-off today in Shell. Turns out the turbo charger in HC-BXB was bad. Mateo and Curtis started changing it, but they won't get the job done until Monday. The normal life of a turbo is 1600 hours. This one only had 400 hours on it. It happened right in front of the hangar. Convenient, and better there than somewhere out in the jungle where it would have been a bit more difficult to repair.

Today Kevin flew his first solo flight on the mission field. The weather couldn't have been more perfect, and he made a couple flights out and back to Makuma. Of course, after his first return to Shell he was doused with water. His wife and son were there to enjoy the accomplishment with him (I'd put some photos up, but I just switched to another hard drive on this computer, and still need to install some software). Since we arrived in Shell four years ago, there are three new pilots. And, another one has come and gone. Three pilots will be leaving in the summer of '05. The turnover of MAF staff on the field is constant. I suppose an average pilot flies on the field about ten years.

By the end of the day I had placed a computer in the passengar bodega. It's a large room where people check-in for flights. People and baggage are weighed there. Cargo is stored in large bins around the room, awaiting the next flight. Recently Patricio has built a desk there, and a sales counter, and that's where they will receive cash and print receipts. I ran the network cable last week, and this week the desk was finished and ready for the computer.

This And That

• Taylor has spent a lot of time playing with Joel in the past two weeks. Joel is in Taylor's fourth grade class, and his dad is a pilot/mechanic. While Joel's mom has been in the US for the past two weeks, Joel has come over to our house after school to do his homework, and on Saturday while his dad was the pilot on call. They have spent the bulk of their time building a fort and playing in it.

• I spent quite a few hours in the past couple days building a yagi antenna for an 802.11b wireless connection. I found a diagram and dimensions on the web, and started work Tuesday afternoon. Today I went over with Curtis to his house and found the antenna doesn't work at all. That was a bit disappointing, but not unexpected. I have an idea about how I can improve things, but it involves a bit of an investment in equipment, and money is tight right now for the program.

• Steve Dunbar is up in Quito tonight, and tomorrow will take the written exam needed to get his permanent license. It will be interesting to see what sort of test he gets. When Dale took the test, it was 100 questions. When Kevin took the test, it was 200 questions!

• We're getting low on avgas. This week all the other operators in Shell ran out of fuel, and have been begging us for fuel. We still have enough to keep operating at this point. We are supposed to get more fuel next week, but the deliveries haven't always arrived when scheduled in the recent past. Currently there is only one supplier of avgas in the country, and the price has increased 9% in the past few months.

• I subbed in Dustin's class yesterday for a couple hours, and then again this morning. Mr. Umble has been sick. There are eight students in the class. Dustin and Taylor W. are the two seventh graders, and the other six are in eighth grade.

• It's now been two weeks since I took my iBook up to Quito to see if I could have it repaired. I'm hoping that the part has been ordered, and will arrive in Quito by tomorrow. Once they have the part, I'll run up there for a day so they can install it. I MISS my iBook very much!!

What's Happening?

As far as MAF flight operations go, last week was busy. For the first time in quite a while, there were four planes operational in Shell, and enough pilots to fly them. Dale, Dan, Steve, Darryl, Kevin, Fred, and Dave all made flights. Kevin must fly with Fred or Darryl, but at least he's starting his field checkout process, now that he has a license in hand. Steve was on call this weekend, and flew Saturday and Sunday. Fred flew one flight for him on Saturday afternoon, as Steve still isn't checked out on the Quito route. Curtis is starting to work again on HC-BQV, with the hope of getting that plane put back together by the end of the year. That's the plane that was involved in a landing incident in Kuakash earlier this year. We had quite a bit of rain last week, and it's raining this morning. We did have some really nice weather on Friday and Saturday.

Team Time

Tuesday night we had our MAF Team meeting at the Dunbars' home. We have these meetings on a monthly basis. Very occasionally we have one of the other local missionaries share with us what is going on with their work. We were blessed with the presence of Lloyd Rogers, and his friend, David Jones, a missionary for forty-five years in Chile. Mr. Jones shared a devotional, and then we heard from Lloyd.

Lloyd is with the Plymouth Brethren and has been working for forty years in Ecuador, most of that time in Shell. The past few years he's been working out of Quito. He runs thirty-six schools in the jungle, and there are 2,842 students in those schools. Compassion International provides funds for 1300 of those students. This year there were forty high school graduates. About seventy-five percent of the teachers are Christians. The schools are located in the four language groups that MAF flies in--the Shuar, Atchuar, Woadani, and Quichua.

In the Quichua and Waodani areas, the oil companies provide teacher salaries and flights to take the teachers in and out of the jungle. The Shuar and Atchuar people do not allow any oil company activity in their areas if at all possible. There is also a Quichua community, Sarayacu, south-east of Shell that is currently battling to keep an oil company from drilling. The schools in those areas do not receive any money from oil companies.

Recently Compassion contracted with some Ecudorian anthropologists to complete a study of the area in which these schools are located. When the study was going on, the anthropologists asked Lloyd why he drove all the Shaman out. Lloyed replied that he didn't drive them out. He said his program was Light, and that light replaces darkness. The Shaman who have moved to other areas did so on their own.

Another story about the anthropologists. They were in a village where the people were feeding them all. The indians had gone out to a big island on the nearby river, and killed a bunch of monkeys for dinner. Lloyd said that the people had given each of the two anthropologists some of the meat from the buttocks of the monkey, the most tender part. Lloyd's piece was tougher, and he commented that the monkey was tough, and that he must have a piece of meat from a grandfather monkey. The anthropologists didn't realize they had been eating monkey meat, and when they found out it was monkey on their plates, they stopped eating. The rest of their time in the jungle, they only ate food that they brought, and no more local food!!

Compassion is looking for sponsors for fifty-three children in Ecuador. Go to their site and do a search for the country of Ecuador if you're interested.

Front Door

This is what was at our front door as I went to work on Monday. The beetle was several inches long. Lucy the Macaw didn't even seem to notice the beetle, hardly paying any attention to it at all. Of course, she was on the carpet, something she really likes. I always tease her and say she's in love with the carpet. She fluffs her feathers up, walks all over it, and touches it with her beak. I only see her act that way when she's on the carpet.

No iBook

It's been a while since I've posted anything. The biggest reason for that is a non-functional computer. Last Tuesday I was working on e-mail, and as I pressed the Delete key, the screen froze with a lot of vertical stripes. It took a while, but I was finally able to get the computer started again, at which point I quickly backed up my files. When I shared my problem with another Macintosh user at the MAF office, he suggested I look at an Apple web site page for a Repair Extension program for iBooks. Sure enough, my iBook had the described problem, and fell inside the range of serial numbers eligable for repair. The next day I flew to Quito with Caleb to do some work at the Avant dorm, where the MAF high school students stay while attending the Alliance Academy. That afternoon I found the Apple Service Center and arranged for repair. They are ordering a new logic board. I kept the iBook, and when the part arrives, I'll take it back up to Quito for the repair to be made. It's going to be mid-October 'til that's all said and done. So, here I sit, using a PC, and generally not spending as much time on a computer. It's probably good for me, as I am stuck in front of my iBook for way too much time during the evenings.