England and Mongolia Arrive

England
We've had quite a busy week. It started last Saturday evening when we drove to Columbus Airport to pick-up Mark & Jenny Beckwith arriving from England. We first met Mark & Jenny last July during our three week trip to the United Kingdom to participate in MAF's two week cross-cultural training seminar, Facts 'N Friction. (If you'd like to re-live our trip to England click here and then click on "newer post" when you're ready to move on.)

Arriving at the airport it was fun to see Mark and Jenny again, and meet their six month old daughter Abi. The Beckwith's made the trip to MMS to be evaluated for apprenticeship as the final stages of application for service with MAF-United Kingdom.

Part of my responsibilities at MMS is to coordinate, facilitate, and oversee the candidate evaluation process through in-hangar evaluation week. For the Beckwiths, that process just wrapped up as we approved them for apprenticeship. Mark & Jenny did very well in the evaluation. Karen and I were able to give them a tour of Coshocton this afternoon and are taking them into Amish country for the day tomorrow. We take them back to the Columbus Airport Sunday afternoon. Lord willing, they'll be back in Coshocton for Mark to start apprenticeship this September or October.

Mark, Jenny and Abigail Beckwith.

Mongolia
After making the airport trip Saturday evening we made a second trip to Columbus Airport Monday night to pick-up Bat-Enkh Lkhamsuren, arriving from Mongolia. This trip was a bit later in the evening as we left home at 11:30 PM Monday night and arrived home at 3:30 AM Tuesday morning.

We were privileged to have Bat-Enkh live with us for six months back in 2004 as he prepared for, and passed, his Airframe & Powerplant exams. Bat-Enkh is a mechanic with an aviation program in Mongolia and has also served two years with a flight program in Tanzania. We grew very close to Bat-Enkh during his visit in 2004 and, when he returned to Mongolia, we weren't sure we'd see him again in this life as it's not often we have the opportunity or the need to travel to Mongolia!

What a blessing to receive an email from Bat-Enkh in December inquiring if he could return to the US and MMS to prepare and test for his FAA Inspection Authorization! He is a talented mechanic has many friends at MMS and we share many friends around the world. We are thrilled to have him back in our home and back in the MMS hangar for the duration of this month. Tucker and Tanner made good friends with Bat-Enkh during his visit in 2004.

Here's Bat in the MMS conference room studying for his exams.

From 2004: Bat with Tucker & Tanner

With the Beckwith's evaluation completed, I'll be focused on putting the April GroundCrew newsletter together next week. As a weather update...it's currently 62 degrees at 9:30 at night and it's supposed to hit 67 degrees tomorrow! We can deal with warmth. Of course next week it's cooling back down, but we'll take the "heat" while we have it.

Thanks for being patient with our posting. I hope to be back to a more regular cycle next week!