Crash Test

My family and I had just sat down to breakfast when my cell phone rang. On the line was a health-clinic worker in Playa Grande, a tiny village in northern Guatemala, about 30 miles east of our home in our own tiny Guatemalan village, Mayalan.

“We have a kid with appendicitis who needs to go to Coban,” the clinic worker said. The nearest hospital is there. “Can you take him?”

I’ve worked as a medevac pilot in remote Guatemalan villages on and off since 2003. My wife, Jennifer, and I both fly. We took a 30-foot Cessna Skymaster 336 that belonged to Great Commission Air, outfitted it with a stretcher and basic medical supplies, and moved from Michigan to Mayalan to ferry the sick—to do what we believed to be the Lord’s work.

“I’m on my way,” I said.

The 15-minute flight to Playa Grande was routine. Minutes after I landed, a pickup truck roared to a stop at the airstrip. A boy got out, doubled over in pain. His name was Ludim. The clinic worker and I strapped him loosely into a passenger seat. We didn’t want the seat belt to pinch his belly.

His mother, Teresa, scampered into the copilot seat beside me. Two more people boarded, as well: a mother and her sick baby. They needed to get to the hospital too—a 20-minute flight away, over relatively flat terrain. I make dozens of these trips a month.

I closed the hatch and placed my hand on the throttle, readying for takeoff. Teresa stopped me. “Can we pray first?” she asked. “Today is my son’s birthday.” She looked at me with begging eyes. If she only knew I had my own need to pray, I thought.

I fingered my shirt—a gift from my wife. Embroidered on it were the words, “Dios es Mi Piloto,” which means, “God is my pilot.” Every bush pilot knows the risks. When you fly solo into remote areas, sooner or later something is bound to go wrong. But this morning I was worried more about the future of our work, the well-being of our family.

Jennifer and I had two young children—Genna, eight, and Beto, four. Money was always an issue. Lord, I’d asked, will we be able to find the funds to continue our mission?

I looked at Teresa and struggled to block my own worries from my mind. “Yes, let’s pray,” I said.

Minutes later we were airborne. Conditions were perfect. Beneath us were mountains and jungle that took my breath away. Still, I couldn’t forget our fund-raising responsibilities. Several times we’d been forced to return to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to raise more money. How many times before the well ran dry?

Focus, I told myself. We were approaching Coban. I dropped down over a low, sharp ridge of mountains, about 1,000 feet above the ground. Time to deploy the wing flaps.