The one thing about being a MAF pilot is that just when you think that you know where you'll be for the next few days, something is bound to turn up to change it all. 2 Thursdays ago I looked at the booking sheet and it looked like it would be a quiet weekend in Dodoma, my next flight being the 'Northern Shuttle' to Arusha on Monday. Halfway through the morning that changed with a call for a medical flight from Iringa to Moshi, and the flight was planned with the return leg to Dodoma that same afternoon...
As is often the way, there were some delays with the patient and we departed Iringa too late to make it back to Dodoma the same day, so that meant an overnight in Moshi. The next day, not long after returning home, I received a call from the operations department to say that there was another request for a medical flight the following morning, this time from Tabora to Dar es Salaam, for a patient who was stretcher-bound and had been making the journey to Dar es Salaam by train. The train journey had proved too much for the patient (the trains here are not like the trains we are used to in Europe!) and the family had decided to call on MAF. This time there were no delays and after delivering the patient, nurse and relative to the waiting ambulance in Dar I was able to fly back to Dodoma that evening.
The following week, other than the flight on Monday, it looked like another quiet one. On Wednesday morning as I made my way into the hangar to join morning devotions, I was called in by the Ops team and told that they had received a request for a flight to Mbeya with an overnight stop, returning the next day. I asked when the passengers wanted to go and the answer was 'as soon as possible' (the 2 passengers were actually sitting in the reception area). So, an hour and a half later we set off for Mbeya. On the return journey the following afternoon I asked what the purpose of the visit had been and the one passenger told me that her father was very sick with Malaria and she had gone to visit him (the flight took less than 2 hours each way- by road it would be more like 12 hours). Evidently she was very pleased to have been able to make the visit and said that he was improving.
It is very rewarding to be able to make a difference in these situations.
One of the lessons I've learned quickly though is always to take an overnight bag...
