A story from Colin Brown, Maun pilot:

At home, tinkering with an electric motor, I am startled out of my concentration as my cell phone rings at my side, it is 3:45 pm. The clinic in Seronga, a village ninety miles away, needs a mercy flight to transport a severely injured woman to the hospital.

Pilots, paramedics, doctors and patients are probably the key players that come to mind when you think of an air ambulance flight. But on the ground, another key player, the Flight Coordinator, is orchestrating events to make the flight happen. During weekday hours, Bojelo Marari, fills the role of Flight Coordinator for FMS air ambulance flights. During non-office hours, Mark Spicer and the pilots on call take over.

At three o'clock Sunday afternoon, the Maun hospital called requesting an air ambulance flight. Roger Weaver and Ryan Cole flew to Maun with the paramedics and transferred a premature baby to Francistown. Shortly before ten o'clock Sunday night, Roger notified Mark, who was "flight-following", that they were back on the ground in Gaborone. They said good night, and Roger went home to bed. Mark went to bed, too. At 11:44, his phone rang.

Since my husband Colin and I arrived in Maun, our hearts desire has been to reflect the love of Christ to others around us. As our first Christmas here approached, we were yearning even more to truly share the meaning of Christ's love with others living in Maun. We began poking around in the Flying Mission storage containers for material resources for ministry, and came across just the blessing we were hoping for. One of the containers was full of boxes of baby clothes and toiletry supplies! We filled our vehicle with all the goodies we had found and returned to the FMS house to sort them with the help of our porter, Robert, and his wife Pusetso.

When I left my house this morning, I knew only that I was going to write a story about a Capacity Building workshop given by Flying Mission. My first question exposed my ignorance. "What is Capacity Building?" I asked Mercy Leshome, the workshop facilitator. "Capacity Building is helping an organisation, or even an individual, become self-supporting and income-producing with skills it already possess, and by teaching new skills", she said. In this case, Mercy was teaching Basic Tools for Managing Finances to volunteers from Home Based Care Groups and HIV/AIDS Support Groups.