Human Resources Update

It's been awhile since I've updated you on what's happening in my department. Here goes:

Candidate Evaluation
Last week I oversaw the in-hangar candidate evaluation of a couple from Tennessee, Richard and Ashley Whittemore. They did well throughout the evaluation process and we accepted them for service Friday. They've returned to Tennessee to complete raising their financial support.

Richard and Ashley Whittemore

With the acceptance of the Whittemores, MMS now has five families in the "approved candidate" category. I'm supervising three of those families as they raise their financial support. The two other families are raising support through other mission agencies.

As we look to the future, I have another couple scheduled for evaluation August 31-September 4. This couple, Jake & Cayton, are from northern California.

While I don't have any open applications at this time, I am working with fifteen people who are in various stages of considering application and with eight people who've made initial inquiries for information about the program.

This morning I was blessed to spend 90 minutes with a prospective candidate who came by for a tour and I'm scheduled for tour tomorrow evening with another prospective candidate. Friday Karen and I are scheduled to spend some time with a gentleman and his wife who are interested in exploring a long-term volunteer relationship with MMS.

Lord willing, I'll finish writing the copy and selecting the photos for MMS's August GroundCrew newsletter this week, will write the minutes from a meeting last week, and continue to handle the day-to-day administrative communication that arrives inside my computer.

Karen will be in the shop this week to give me a hand on Wednesday or Thursday as works out best with Friday being a holiday.

Thanks for keeping us in your prayers and thanks for being so faithful in sending your gifts. We wouldn't be here if it weren't for you there. We praise the Lord for your commitment and ask that He would richly bless you in ways only He can.

May God receive the glory!

Saturday Report

Karen's figuring our finances and taking care of the laundry. I just finished dead-heading the roses and sprayed them for blackspot and Japanese beetles. The beetles were shredding the foliage. So far the beetles don't seem to be as bad as last year, but it's still a bit early I think. I'd already sprayed the roses last week but now the battle is joined. Me and Ortho are all over those bad bugs and little black spots. Later I'll take care of some paperwork and then head outside to pull the tall sides off of the dog ramp. We'd put them up to help keep Hope from falling but as you know, they're not necessary any more.

Our day actually started rather early with a couple of Cocker Spaniels howling at the bottom of the stairs. For some reason I wake them up every morning when I come downstairs during the work week, but on Saturday they are always up before we are and feel inclined to let us know how lonely they feel. Go figure.

Lately the dogs and I've started our Saturdays (once the howling session ceases), with a drive to the Circle K market for a medium coffee and then a trip up to the airport for a run in the grass. I drink the coffee, they don't. They run, I walk. I also whistle for them, yell, wave my arms, and chase them down when they're getting carried away by total doggy-ness.

There's about a 20 acre section of cleared land across from the airport itself that the dogs really enjoy exploring. There are deer droppings to eat, ground hogs to track, there's thick grass to chew on, and lots of neat smelling things to roll in. Jolly. The dogs like the rolling part more than we do. However, today they were far more busy running than rolling which is fine.

They also soaked up several acres of early morning dew. We hit the fields about 6:30 AM as the sun was rising and it wasn't long before they were soaking, dripping, wringing wet. They loved it and it's always fun to watch them having fun.

Here are a several photos:

Tracking a ground hog

Tucker and Tanner hitting their stride

Tanner passes in review

Tanner & Tucker ready for the ride home.

A Visit From PA

Does any other state refer to their state by it's initials? If you're from Pennsylvania you pronounce PA as "P-A", not "Pennsylvania". I don't think I'm aware of any other states that do that. Odd. It just sounds right. "O-H" just doesn't sound right. Humm.

All that Pennsylvania trivia aside. We were delighted to have Randy and Shirl Pearson and two of their sons, Matt and Bob stop on their travels to spend the night with us last night. They were returning from a trip to see family and decided to stop and see us as they traveled back toward home. Randy has stayed with us before but Shirl and the boys had never been to Coshocton or MMS. The Pearson's are from our PA home church, Grace Church at Willow Valley, near Lancaster, PA. They served as missionaries with JAARS (the aviation side of Wycliffe) when their three boys were younger. Randy has recently become a welcome and vital addition to the board of MMS Aviation. It was fun to share our home community with Shirl, Matt and Bob and give them a tour of MMS Aviation "up on the hill."

Randy & Shirl, Matt & Bob

Randy is a great pilot. Anyone who can fly in Papua New Guinea for twelve years has to be a good pilot! While Keith and I were dating, Randy offered to fly me out to visit with Keith while he traveled on for an overnight meeting. Then he would pick me up on his way home. I was excited to be able to fly to see Keith. I'd never done much flying. Being one that sometimes can fight with motion sickness, I was a bit apprehensive about flying in a plane smaller than a 737. But, Keith was worth it and I never even questioned the decision. When I arrived at the single runway Smoketown Airport to meet Randy and saw the plane we were flying in, thoughts of motion sickness began to fade and claustrophobia began to surface. The four seat Cessna was just a little less "roomy" than the 737 I had flown in. But, with Randy as pilot and one of the young men from our church as co-pilot we had smooth travels and he pulled that little plane right up to the door at MMS. Way cool! It was smooth travels all the way.

After dinner and dessert last evening Shirl and Matt and I took off to see the historic Roscoe Village in our little town and to walk in the park...two of the finer aspects of Coshocton. Keith, Bob and Randy stayed back to clean up the dishes and work out something about leaping frogs on the computer.

Karen & Shirl

After a night of rest, some coffee cake and fruit salad and a tour of MMS, we sent them off on the last leg of their journey home. Visitors from "home", be it PA or CA (See! You didn't say "C-A" did you?) are always an encouragement. It's fun to share what God is doing here in Ohio and encouraging to hear what God is doing in our PA home church. So, if you're ever passing through Ohio, give us a call!

Quick MMS Snapshots & Home Visitors

I thought I'd post some random snapshots I took today while overseeing the candidate evaluation currently underway.

Two maintenance projects on the ramp between Hangar B & C.

Paul and Mike troubleshoot GCI's Cessna 310 in front of Hangar A.

LAMP's Cessna 337 waiting for the overhaul of its engines to be completed.

Away from the hangar, Karen and I are expecting visitors this evening. Randy and Shirl are stopping in for an overnight visit. Randy and Shirl are from our home church in Pennsylvania. As I write this they're up in Kidron, OH enjoying a walk through Lehman's Hardware. Lehman's is quite the place.

Wonderful Weather In Ohio

We're having wonderful weather right now. Karen might think 86 is a bit on the warm side, but I think 30 degrees is a bit on the cold side so we kind of average our seasons out. She likes winter, I like summer. She likes to shovel snow, I'd rather mow grass. She likes to bundle up and have a fire, I like shorts and flip flops and ice tea on the deck. We're quite the team.

Ah yes, the weather. I could drone on about it for several more paragraphs (this is like the BEST weather to ride my bike in. 60 degrees on the way in and 80+ on the way home. Ahhh.....) but photos might be more interesting for you. I just took these shots a few minutes ago.

The MMS hangar complex looking northeast with Hangar C in the back.

Here's the main building looking into Hangar B. The admin wing is on the left.
This is taken from the opposite angle from the photo above.

Looking north up the taxiway to Runway 22.

The "Heart Trees" over one of the fairways of Hilltop Golf Course which is right below the threshold to Runway 4. Karen and I noticed these last evening when we were up at the airport letting Tucker and Tanner have a good run.

Hey, Honey, have I told you lately that I love you? Well, I do love you!

Labor Intensive

Mission aviation maintenance is a labor intensive endeavor. And because aviation maintenance labor fee in a commercial shop runs right around $60 per hour, many airplanes that have sustained substantial damage are written off as scrap by insurance companies because it's often cheaper for them to replace an airplane than it might be to finance its repair.

That's where MMS Aviation comes in. Because everyone at MMS is a faith-supported missionary, we donate our time spent repairing missionary airplanes and do all the in-house work without charging any labor. All the missions pay for is the parts and materials we have to buy to facilitate the repair. This provides substantial savings to the mission agencies we serve.

If you're a regular blog follower, you know we have three long-term, missionary aircraft restoration projects underway: the Moody 182, the Honduran 206, and the Brazilian 206.

The Moody 182
While the engine and airframe repairs are completed, the instrument panel still needs a bit of work. Shortly after Mike completes the avionics upgrade and installation, this airplane will be ready to return to service.

The Moody 182 instrument panel

The Honduran 206
Ian shot the final color coat on the fuselage today. The next step is to paint the registration numbers on the wings.

Ian shoots blue paint after finishing with the white and red.

Ian pulls tape after the blue paint has set.

The Brazilian 206
The primary focus of the Brazilian 206 restoration right now is the modification to its horizontal stabilizer. Andy and Tim are spending the vast majority of their time focused on fabricating the necessary pieces, making repairs, and pre-fitting all the components in order to make sure it's all going to fit together when they finally start putting it all together.

Tim drills holes for the nut plates and Andy makes a repair.

The Weekend Arrives

At The Shop
This past week ended up being something of a blur. Maybe you can relate? Karen worked three days up at the hangar last week. Those three days were very helpful to me as our CEO, Training Manager, and Director of Office Administration were all out of the office.

I spent the bulk of my week working with three of the four families who are raising support to begin service with MMS. Part of my responsibility is to supervise their support raising process. The fourth family is being supervised by MAF-UK. It's exciting to be able to have a direct role in helping them build the relationships necessary in order to serve as missionaries. Thank you for support of us which allows us to train and supervise others in raising their own support.

Recruiting was another main focus of my week. While we don't actively "recruit" folks for MMS (we trust God to lead the right people to us), another of my responsibilities is to facilitate the information flow, and provide direction and counsel, to those around the world who've expressed an interest in serving within mission aviation either as pilot/mechanic or as a maintenance specialist. I'm in contact with about fifteen people in that status right now.

Should that interest turn into opportunity, I'm the one responsible for scheduling and overseeing the application, evaluation, and orientation process for candidates. We currently have two candidate evaluations scheduled: one next week for a couple from Tennessee and one in early September for a couple from California.

In between were the daily meetings, emails, phone calls, tours to lead, photos to take, the MMS blog to write, and a new organizational table-top display to complete.

At Home
We're still adapting to life without Hope (Karen's furry friend of 15 years). While without Hope, we still have the two Cocker Spaniels. And today was their ears, paws, and claws maintenance day. You can imagine how much Tucker and Tanner LOVED that!

We've had some rather serious storms the past few days. No damage, just lots of rain, lightning and thunder. There was a threat of tornadoes but none materialized.

I'd planned to post photos of our garden for several days now but by the time I'd get home on the bicycle, what sun there'd been was lost behind heavy overcast. With the last storm blowing through early this morning, we're enjoying "mostly sunny" conditions right now. Hot, humid, breezy, it finally feels a bit like summer in Ohio. Karen's missing winter, I'm happy as a clam.

So, here are some garden photos to enjoy:

Tall purple things

Day Lilly and tall purple thing

Looking east: Bell peppers and tomatoes.
The local bunnies ate two of our pepper plants in the center.

Jalapeno and banana peppers

Looking west

It looks like it's going to be another good year for Karen's Side Street Salza!

Preparing People (and Planes)

Our ministry at MMS is two-fold: 1) to prepare people to serve as missionary airplane mechanics while we; 2) maintain, modify, and repair missionary airplanes.

This past week was the culmination of the "preparing people" part for two of our apprentices, David Mozombite and Gertjan Kamphorst.

Both David and Gertjan completed their requirements to take the FAA written exams and passed them in May. Just last week David and Gertjan also passed their oral and practical exams allowing them to receive their FAA A&P mechanic's certificates.

This is an exciting and somewhat stressful time for the apprentice families as they complete service with MMS, take and pass the exams, and begin their transition to service with an aviation ministry beyond our hangar doors.

David Mozombite
David and Amy are transitioning from MMS into service with South America Mission. They've been assigned to SAM's flight program in Bolivia where David will serve as a maintenance specialist. David (pronounced da-Veed) is originally from Peru. They have three children: Isaiah, Lilly, and Asher.

Gertjan Kamphorst
Gertjan and Glenda previously served in Papua New Guinea with MAF-Australia. They came to MMS so Gertjan, a pilot, could also become a mechanic. This has opened the door for them to serve with MAF-US. They'll soon be moving to Nampa, Idaho to complete their orientation and standarization for service with MAF. They have two children, Johan & Marielle. Gertjan is originally from the Netherlands and Glenda is from the Philippines.

As it's exciting and somewhat stressful for the families who are leaving, it's exciting and sad for those of us on staff remaining behind. It's exciting because the goal of investing our lives in each of these families is so they will move on to effective mission service with other organizations. This is exactly what the Kamphorsts and Mozombites are doing. And yet, after living and working so closely with each of these families for so long, it's sad to say goodbye to our good friends.

Monday Catch-up

Friday Night
Friday night we attended a free movie under the stars in the lot where the Park Hotel used to be on Main Street here in Coshocton. Abandoned for years, the once high-end Park Hotel burned down several years ago. It was a big fire (as the first floor was a Sherwin/Williams paint store). The local firemen did a great job saving the businesses connected to the hotel and by that saving the whole city block. All that's left is a dirt patch where the hotel use to stand.

Recently a local contractor donated sod to make a green island in the sea of brown dirt. This sod is the seating area for the "theater under the stars." Karen and I had great fun attending the first event which started at 9:15 PM. The event featured the movie "Shrek" and it was a fun time of families on blankets, folding chairs, popcorn and sodas. Karen brought some hot chocolate. The movie was shown on a smooth section of a remaining wall that had been painted white. The movie was free and popcorn and sodas were available for donations.

Here's the theater.

We'll probably be there again this Friday night.

Saturday
Saturday we worked around the house in the morning, attended an open house for one of the MMS kids graduating from high school in the early afternoon, bought mulch and then spread the mulch in our expanded salsa garden through the evening. We'll get some photos of the garden posted before too much longer.

Sunday
Sunday was another great day of worship at Fresno Bible Church. Karen has back on the worship team for the past several Sundays. It always a little more fun when I'm drumming and Karen's singing. I play the drums every week, the ladies rotate on and off every six weeks.

After worship we came home, loaded our bikes on the Honda and headed off on an adventure to explore Dillon State Park outside of Zanesville. It's about 28 miles SW from Coshocton. Tucker and Tanner weren't too happy with us being gone all morning and then leaving for the rest of the afternoon.

Tanner and Tucker are unhappy about us leaving again.

Dillon State Park is associated with a reservoir and, unless you're a serious mountain biker (which Karen and I are not) the trails are a hospital trip waiting to happen and a great opportunity for some sort of disaster show. The area was pretty, they had nice facilities and you can fish, but it really isn't what we were looking for as a fun place for middle aged missionaries to ride a bicycle for fun.

We did enjoy a picnic.

The view from our picnic spot.

It was a different way for us to spend a Sunday afternoon, we met some nice people, and learned a little bit more about east central Ohio.

Rainy Day In Coshocton

Until I started this post, I was writing the minutes from this morning's two hour staff meeting. Karen is updating and inputting MMS mailing list data. Josh is measuring engine parts for the CMML engine overhaul, Mike is weaving electrical wire for the Moody 182, and Chuck is cleaning a fuel pump. Tim is writing an airplane maintenance log book entry which will allow GCI's 172 to return to service. Dennis just installed a new battery in a local airplane, Dwight and Dave just finished leading a group of children on a tour through MMS, and Andy and Tim F. are still working with the Brazilian 206's horizontal stabilizer.

There's activity in the hangar but it's quiet activity. No rhythmic pounding of rivet guns, no high-pitched whine of an air drill, no teeth-jarring screech from a cut-off wheel on aluminum to compete with the soothing drip of the rain from the hangar doors and building edges. The grass is green outside. The trees lush with leaves. Nearby, groundhogs peer from the tree line's perimeter and squirrels dash from branch to branch as trapeze artists of the furry sort.

Thundershowers rolled through this morning turning into a warm summer drizzle this afternoon. It's a good soaking rain that we've needed here in Coshocton. Corn's in the ground and up about six inches. The soybean plants have broken through the soil and stand a little shorter than the corn. The hangar doors are open to take advantage of the gentle 76 degree breeze. A radio station plays through a computer on a tool box near one of the airplanes. And it's easy to want to sleep.

But no one's sleeping. There's work to be done.

GCI's 172 sits in the rain on the ramp outside Hangar A waiting for its maintenance logbook entry to be completed.

Looking to Hangar C from Hangar B. GCI's 310 is on the left.
The Brazilian 206's horizontal stabilizer is on the right.

Midweek Update

Hello everyone. I'm trying to squeeze a blog in between dinner and leaving for prayer meeting/worship team practice. Karen's taken over doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen for me tonight to facilitate my blogging. She's quite the gal! Tonight dinner was Thai Stir-Fry Chicken Salad (but THAT's another blog).

Warmer Weather Means Bike Riding
With the warmer weather I'm back riding my bicycle to the shop on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. We rode our bikes quite a bit during our recent vacation at the Outer Banks in North Carolina and had fun exploring Kitty Hawk, Kill Devil Hills, and Nags Head at the much more leisurely pace of pedal power. It was totally flat there and it was nice to be by the beach.

The five mile ride to the mission here is totally flat, too, right up until the 250 foot, half-mile hill on the top of which the airport (and MMS) is located. It takes me about ten minutes to ride up the hill and less than a minute to get to the bottom. I climb at about three miles an hour and ride down at 40.

Here I am arriving home after a day at the mission.

Karen Was Up At MMS Today
Normally Karen works up at MMS on Thursdays and Fridays but with the backlog of work that stacked up over her two weeks of vacation (I only had ONE week of vacation!) she came in and spent the afternoon inputting the mailing list of one of our candidate families. One of Karen's responsibilities is to manage each of our families' and the organizational mailing lists. It's a big job.

Karen inputs the 250 addresses on the newest mailing list.

Having a House Guest
The past three days we were blessed to host Tim as our house guest. Tim's son, Kevin, was part of the LeTourneau University missions team that served a week with us back in March. Kevin made plans to return for three days and while we were working out the details Tim asked if he could come along to help too. While Tim was with us, Kevin stayed three doors down with Andy. The arrangements worked out very well.Tim and Kevin kept busy in the hangar and worked on several different projects while they were here.

Volunteers Tim and Kevin.

2009 Coshocton Balloon Festival: Sunday Launch

The first weekend in June is always the Coshocton Hot Air Balloon Festival. It's held at the Coshocton County Fairgrounds which is just a short walk from our house. This year 24 balloons participated in the festival.We don't typically make it over to the festivities but the festivities, in a sense, nearly always make it over our house on Saturday or Sunday morning because of the predominant wind direction.

With the morning launches anywhere between 6 and 7 AM, we are usually awakened the the sounds of multiple high-power gas burners heating the air inside various balloons as they leave the fairgrounds on their way into the country side. Saturday morning's launch was canceled due to fog but Sunday morning about 6:30 the dogs were barking and gas burners were roaring and I hurried outside with my camera.

It's not uncommon to find several neighbors outside in their pajamas and robes with cups of coffee watching the balloons fly overhead. It's quite the cultural experience.

Here are some shots I captured from our back deck before leaving for worship team practice.

Balloons launching from the fairgrounds and headed toward our house. The picture is taken looking over our neighbor's house across the street.

Balloon

Balloon

Balloon

Balloon basket close up

Balloons past our house and headed out of town.

So, if you're ever looking for a fun weekend to come out and visit, keep the first weekend in June in mind! Maybe then we'll even go over to the festival to see the balloons before they come over to see us.

Bath Day

With company coming tomorrow, and after a romp in the woods by the airport this morning, it was Bath Day for Tucker and Tanner. Tucker was particularly disappointed as she'd found a wonderful pile of aromatic material to roll in while on the romp and was quite enjoying the organic "perfume" smeared all over the side of her face and inside her left ear.

Tucker went first, as ladies should, and Tanner followed. Here's a brief photo documentary:

Oh the pain of it all.

Tucker's final rinse.

Tanner tried to hide in their dog house.

Next!

This doesn't feel so bad.

Tanner's final rinse.

Tanner & Tucker air-drying on the deck.

Karen's Home!

Karen's Home!

Karen's Through Cincinnati

Karen's through Cincinnati (three hours SW of here) and headed toward Columbus. I'm busy getting the guest rooms ready for Brenda, Karen's sister, and Rebecca, Karen's niece. A few minutes ago I finished my last meal of hot dogs (Ball Park All Beef on whole wheat/oatmeal bread w/Miracle Whip, Heinz 57, and Tabasco Sauce; chips (Lay's Classic); and a Dr. Thunder (budget Dr. Pepper) for a while (which isn't necessarily a bad thing). Tucker and Tanner are curled up together watching me scoot around the house. I'm ready for some home cookin beyond the micro-wave and tube steaks!

Most of the severe thunderstorms have moved east into PA so Karen & Brenda shouldn't have any real weather to deal with as they finish out their long road trip.

Gotta go finish the guest rooms...

Karen's Getting Closer

Karen and her sister started driving from the Atlanta area around 9 AM this morning. They're now north of Knoxville and still taking miles off the tires. That puts them just about halfway to Coshocton. Another eight hours or so and she should be home. Wahoo!

Karen Comes Home Tomorrow!

I'm busy organizing the house and doing laundry this evening. Karen's coming home from Georgia tomorrow night and the dogs and I are more than ready to return the home management responsibilities to her.

It's not that we've torn the place up while she's been away (though Tanner did eat a big, thick, hardbound library book over the weekend) but it's been six and a half years since I've really batched it for so long and it's taking a while for the skills to come back. It's been a good reminder of why I shouldn't ever live in anything larger than a one room apartment without a worthy woman to handle the home front and Karen is one Worthy Woman! Praise the Lord!

Every now and then, given the right situation, it can be good to be apart from each other for a time. And it has been good to be apart this time, but it's so much better to be together! Enough apart-ness for now. Come on home, Sweetie. It's going to be wonderful to be have you home!

Saving $2,000 and 90 Days for Gospel Carrier International

Gospel Carrier International's King Air was back in for a repair last week.

It seems two tracks for the restroom privacy door had broken making the door nearly impossible to use. Our guys researched the parts and found that the two tracks cost $1,000 each and would take 90 days to be delivered. Both the price and the timetable were unacceptable but sometimes you have to pay the asking price and accept the unacceptable. But because of MMS and the ministry we provide, this wasn't one of those times, Praise the Lord!

One of two, broken privacy door tracks for the GCI King Air 200. At $1,000 each, this repair was going to cost $2,000 and it was going to take 90 days to receive the parts!

The door tracks aren't structural or related to the airworthiness of the aircraft. They are simply plastic interior pieces that can be removed and/or replaced as needed. Dennis, our Chief Engineer, remembered having some surplus PVC sheeting in storage of a similar thickness to the door tracks. He pulled the surplus, measured and traced the door tracks, and before long had fabricated new tracks that were stronger and substantially more durable than the factory's original foam/resin design yet with with similar weight characteristics.

The repairs were completed within the week, the materials were free, and GCI was able to return their airplane to service this afternoon.

The GCI King Air returns to service earlier this afternoon.
(Click to enlarge photo)

What a blessing to be able to save GCI $2000 of their ministry resources and 85 days of waiting!

Thank you for your prayers and gifts which allow us to return missionary aircraft to service in a timely fashion for far less cost than would be otherwise possible.