My day

Dear Family,

Yesterday, August 26:

I left at 8:00 AM with a load of tin roofing for Tasba Pain, 1 hour drive away. There was a bridge out, so the tin and tools had to be carried the last 1/2 mile to the church. I left a watchman with the truck. I was putting the roofing on the church veranda, the one the group that was here last month helped to build. The tin went on well, and it was done in a couple hours. When I got back to the truck, ready to leave back home, a mother with a sick baby wanted a ride to our house, and then would find another truck going to Waspam the next day to the hospital. I told her fine, come along. Part way back, there was a sawmill I wanted to stop by and get some lumber for some steps that are rotting away in the rain. It was on a well traveled road, leaving our main road. I thought it was just a short distance, and went through some big puddles and mud holes, I put it in 4x4. After awhile of driving along and thinking it was just around the next corner, I got out and asked the people riding in the back of the truck where this place was, they said right up here soon. They said they thought the road went on through and would hit another road closer to our house. I said OK, and got back in. The next big puddle was really deep. The problem is these big mudholes fill with water and you don't know how deep they are. Big trucks and skidders go through them and they have deep ruts, and a high center. This bottomed out the truck, even thought I was going fast. I didn't have enough momentum to get through it, but got right into the middle. The wheels spun free, doing nothing. Water was up to the bottom of the doors. We were a good 40 minutes drive (maybe 2 hour walk) from the main road, deep in the bush. We worked on it about an hour, and then gave up. I decided to just walk to Tronquera and get the motorcycle with some equipment. There is an American visiting named Greg (who got us Internet), so we left walking. We left Brandel at the truck, with the mother, baby, her daughter, and her young son, and my watchman. First we thought we might come to the sawmill, and they would have a tractor and come pull us out. We found the sawmill after 1/2 hour of walking, but no sign of any vehicles or equipment, and no one around. We found a couple workers tents, but all the roads and trails petered out there, so we didn't know how to go through to the road closer to our house. We went about 1/2 way back to the truck, and followed a fork that was well traveled. It ended with a lumber camp, abandoned. We walked back to the truck. It would take 5 or 6 hours at least to walk to Tronquera going back the way the truck had come. It was 3:00 PM, 3 hours before dark. It looked like we might be stuck overnight, and the poor sick baby was coughing away.

Plan A had failed, we called on the radio to Marilyn with plan B. I had her find a guy and give him our good bicycle, a couple 50 foot nylon straps, and the com-a-along, and send him here. It was about a 2 or 3 hour bike ride. He might make it before dark. Then we set to work. Brandel and the other little boy about his age started emptying the water out of this mud hole. They dug ditches with sticks, then used their rubber boots to bail the water out while standing almost waist deep in the muddy water. The mud was a sticky, slick clay, the kind that sucks your boot down into it and it is very hard to pull out. I got the jack out and with a left over lumber slab under it, managed to get a wheel a few inches higher, pumping the jack under water in some places. We cut down about 20 little trees into 1 foot chunks and packed them under the wheels. After all four of the wheels were up a little, we could rock the truck back and forth. We would go back, then pack more logs under the front, then go forward, and kept doing this, working in water past our elbows kneeling in the mud pushing sticks under nice and stacked. After it was not high centered, we made a road of little logs (underwater by feel) for it about 30 feet long, and drove it out. It took about 2 hours, but now we were on the wrong side of the mud puddle. We had to cut 3 trees and a stump down to make a road around the puddle, as we didn't want to get stuck again! During all this, a pouring rain thunderstorm soaked us, and filled the water back up in the hole. We managed to get around it, and only had to push once more just a little in another puddle on the way out. We met the guy coming on the bike, he was soaked from the hard rain, but he had made good time. He had a few snacks my wife had packed, which was nice since we had no lunch. We were out with no damage to the truck, just tired, wet, and covered in mud. We were thankful. It was just before dark now, and we were driving along home, in the rain, and found a truck (this road has very little traffic) off in the ditch. The people stopped us, we figured they were stuck. Closer investigation revealed they had caught the shoulder and run off the road, and hit a tree. The tree was big, and had smashed into the engine. One guy was hurt, bleeding some on his face, and his shoulder or upper appeared to be broken. They wanted to go to Waspam. We piled them into the truck, and went on home. Greg and I changed out of our soaked clothes, and jumped back in the truck headed to the hospital in Waspam. We delivered him and the baby to the hospital, and got back home by 8:30 PM -- a long day. The sad thing was I had a winch for the truck, sitting back at home in my house. I have had it for a year, and just never got it put on the truck. Now guess what! It went right up to the top of my priority list.

August 27 -- Today we were tired out from yesterday, and decided to take it easy. About 9 AM someone came along and said this tractor trailer, a fully loaded semi, was stuck just down the road from us and asked for help. What can I do with a little 4x4 pickup? I took my come-a-long and nylon straps (still wet from yesterday), and went there. The right around the corner turned into 40 minutes. The truck wasn't stuck bad, and we shoveled on it for awhile, then I did pull it out with my little truck, amazingly. During this time, Marilyn called on the radio and Waspam was calling for a transport from their hospital to Port. I went back, preflighted the plane, changed clothes, and was off to Waspam and Port. I was back home by 5 PM, in time to eat supper and get ready for Sabbath.

Not all days are this busy.

Best Regards,

Clint

 

Clint and Marilyn Hanley
Wings Over Nicaragua Mission
www.wingsovernicaragua.org
info@wingsovernicaragua.org
Reaching the Miskito Indians with Aviation and Medical Work