Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010

Relief flights take off

Johnston airport becomes link in relief chain

Michael and Gord Tessier couldn't bear to see the devastation in Haiti playing across their television screens. So last week they fueled up their Cessna 337G and took off from a Canadian airport, bound for Johnston County.

Their plane was one of about a dozen to pass through the county airport en route to Haiti last week. All were part of a fleet of small planes that has shuttled supplies and help since an earthquake devastated the small island country on Jan. 12.

"Normally you let the pros take care of this, but this is overwhelming," Gord Tessier said at the airport last week. "We were chomping at the bit, and nobody was ready for us, eh?"

Johnston County was ready. The pilots volunteered at habitatbahamas.org, then geared up for their flight.

After the wheels hit the tarmac, the Canadian brothers were greeted with thousands of pounds of medical and survival supplies gathered by local charities like Horne Memorial United Methodist Church.

The Tessiers, who work as insurance agents, will fly a few hundred pounds of supplies, like IV fluids, antibiotics and satellite phones, to an operations base in Nassau run by Bahamas Habitat and Bahamas Methodist Habitat. Then, they'll likely ferry a load of supplies to one of Haiti's outlying airports, where refugees have flocked from Port-au-Prince, the nation's hard-hit capital.

"There are four or five outlying airports that we can get into with smaller aircraft," said John Armstrong, president of Bahamas Habitat, the group that has organized the airlift. "If we weren't doing what we're doing, then the only point of supply is in [Port-au-Prince] -- there's no way it's ever going to get out."

A shattered infrastructure has slowed the spread of relief to the outlying parts of Haiti, where refugees from Port-au-Prince desperately need food and medical supplies. Last week, the airlift landed 1,500 pounds of rice and beans at an orphanage that had run out of food and brought a team of 12 doctors to the island, Armstrong said.

Over the past few years, Bahamas Habitat has used small planes to deliver supplies to Bahamas Methodist Habitat, a charity. When the disaster struck Haiti, the group was in a good position to deliver early help, so it put out a call for pilots, aircraft and donations.

So far, more than 190 people with aircraft have offered their help, and Rotary International has helped with funding and the distribution of supplies in Haiti. More than 20 planes are involved, with more coming, Armstrong said.

"Pilots from all over the States and Canada want to give back for the privileges they have," Michael Tessier said.

And though small aircraft don't hold a candle to the cargo capacity of their big brothers, they can hopscotch through small airports in Ohio, Florida and Georgia to pick up supplies. In Haiti, the planes can reach tiny airstrips where larger craft might have trouble.

At the Johnston County Airport, local organizer Jim Lee said pilots and volunteers have had easier access than they might enjoy at busier Raleigh-Durham, though the airlift did run supplies through RDU without much difficulty last week. Ray Hales gave the use of part of his hangar for the mission, and the Airport Authority has sold fuel at cost for the flights.

"We've got everybody behind us," said Jim Lee of Clayton, who has helped organize the airlift in Johnston County.