“We were in a strip of water one and a half meters wide and very deep, so we decided to get out and push the boat, we just wanted to be out of that place,” YWAM worker, Elias Santos said describing one perilous trip to Luwawe from Sofala, Mozambique. “The water level went down and we were in a swamp surrounded by trees, mud and mosquitoes. We started to push from the sides, slipping in the mud. During this pushing I slipped and fell, becoming stuck between the boat and mud wall of the river, my head was just above water. Thankfully the rescue team was strong and swift so that I didn’t drown.”In Luwawe there is no school or doctor, and the drinking water was, as Santos reported, darker than tea. And so the Youth with a Mission (YWAM) team working with the Aluwawe people begin each journey as many do traveling between villages in Mozambique, across swamps, down rivers and through forest, avoiding a herd of buffalo in one area. “The difficulty in getting to this place means that only those who really want to do something will go there,” he said. After reaching the Aluwawe and working in the village, the return trip was just as difficult.

Mosquito-ridden, muddy, miserable are just a few of the words Shephen Mbewe, director of YWAM Marromeu in Sofala, Mozambique, would use in explaining the four-day journey from Sofala to Luwawe. That was before Mercy Air (MA) pilot Matthias Reuter looked at an aviation map of the area and saw that the grueling journey they have made since 2000 would take only 20 minutes by helicopter.

Reuter heard of YWAM’s work with the Aluwawe people through his friend, Doctor Colin Pfaff, whom he met flying in eastern Mozambique with Doctors for Life. Pfaff had forwarded Reuter a report by Elias Santos of an outreach to the Aluwawe. In it, Santos told of the four-day journey just to reach the village.

Two months later he received an e-mail from a friend of Santos. Santos’ friend knew someone with a helicopter and asked if Mbewe could use it in the work he was doing with the Aluwawe. It would come fully funded for an outreach of eight days and a total 38 flights. In September 2006, at a cost of US $9,000, a Mercy Air helicopter was used for an outreach to the Aluwawe.

Following the September outreach, MA has been requested to come during four outreaches in 2007. The government is in full support of the program, Reuter said, but funding for those flights is not yet secured.

Mbewe said the 20-minute flight to Luwawe was hard to believe. “I actually got disoriented,” he said. “I could not work out where we were. It was too quick and so hassle free it was unreal. In my head I have become so accustomed to the hardships of going to Luwawe so much so that to get there without a single mosquito bite just did not seem right.”

In 2005 Mercy Air flew a distance nearly equal to four times around the world. Of those flights, 82 percent were for outreaches.

The Mercy Air base in South Africa started in 1991 and is the only MA base in Africa. Its crew consists of five pilots and two mechanics for their one helicopter, two six-seat airplanes and one 11-seat airplane.

“God used YWAM and Mercy Air as a means to bring his truth to people who feel unloved and uncared for,” said Stephen. “We were able to show that God will go where the people are, at whatever cost, and will reach them with His love where they live.”

To learn more about Mercy Air visit www.mercyair.org. For information on YWAM Marromeu contact Shephen.Mbewe@senasugar.com.