Our missionaries Mission Aviation Fellowship

Mission Fellowship (MAF), Australia

Ben & Anne Sibthorpe worked with MAF for over ten years in Africa and in June 2010 moved with their family to Australia where Ben became hanger supervisor at MAF’s heavy engineering Centre in Mareeeba. Ben & Anne have five children Alice, Jack, Olivia, Estella, and Edith who was born in Australia. Mareeba is a farming community in Northern Queensland, where the outback meets the rainforest. Among other events it has an annual rodeo.

The base is responsible for engineering maintenance and overhaul services for their planes flying throughout South East Asia, among the isolated Aboriginal peoples in Arnhem Land, Australia, and to Papua New Guinea, where flying is very challenging due to the constantly changing tropical weather, dense mountainous jungle, and very underdeveloped airstrips.

Before Easter Ben and a colleague flew to Papua New Guinea to fix one of the MAF planes. It was carrying supplies to the Mission house to enable the doctor to stay when doing his routine clinics, but had had a heavy landing at one of the tricky jungle airstrips. It was stranded in a very isolated area, so everything needed for the job was flown in. Also, the approach to the one-way strip was through a narrow valley. One chance at landing. Miss and you meet your Maker! Ben (on the ladder) and his colleague managed to fix it in a couple of days under the watchful eye of the local villagers.

Click on the link below to watch a clip about his venture to PNG.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAXqisy5W-g

Ben has also been involved in creating and completing a purpose-built paint spraying hangar, which is invaluable for the work, but also can be rented out when there is space. They had a crop spraying aeroplane in, called an air tractor - it looked like a tractor too.