“Seeing people smile and live healthy lives makes us happy every day and this is what motivates me to continue serving despite the circumstances,” emotional Chief Executive Officer of Samaritan Aviation Mark Palm echoed.
The dream and passion of serving people of Papua New Guinea particularly the remote and water land areas of East Sepik province came about in 1994, Mark Palm reflected.
“The dream came in 1994, when we first saw an area in East Sepik where people are some kilometers away from the nearest hospital and it usually takes them three days to reach the hospital.”
“The question that popped out was how we can change the three hours to just an hour,” Palm said.
It’s been 13 years now since 2010 the non-government Christian organization Samaritan Aviation dedicated their lives to serving the people of East Sepik by airlifting patients, and providing emergency services for free.
The Samaritan Aviation Chief Executive Officer Mark Palm said, they provides free services like; delivery of medical supplies, emergency evacuation, disaster relief response, immunization outreach or delivering health programs to the people of Sepik River.
“Personally, you don’t realize the ups and downs sometimes, you know people living in rural and inaccessible areas is always a challenge.”
Mr Palm could not hold back his tears when reflecting to recent assistance.
He said for this year they have already airlifted 81 people.
“When people suffer from snake bite, mothers struggle during child birth and other types of sicknesses, tribal fights, we assist victims.”
“People in the remote communities deserve to live.”
“There’s no hope for the people if we are not here to help”
He shared a few experiences from his time, serving the remotest parts of East Sepik Province.
“A mother delivered twins, one was born on a canoe while paddling down to reach us and the other she gave birth to while flying on the aeroplane.”
“Luckily we went to Sepik River and saved a boy bitten by poisonous snake while the villagers having feast for successfully hunting three crocodiles”
“This all reminds me of the impact we’ve done here as an organization in serving life, praying and sharing Jesus, the word of God.”
“We play a small part and with this experience it will keep me going and that’s what Samaritan Aviation is all about”
The organization has been operating for 13 years now and plans to expand out to other provinces and one of them is Gulf province.
“Our goal is to start expansion into gulf province as well because it is a place full of water and is remote.”
“We already had discussions and are now working with Gulf leaders to deliver services there and expand to other areas.”
“Our teams are amazing, and we are thankful for everyone including partners in saving lives.”
CEO Palm said they have been assisted by Partners, like East Sepik Provincial Government, East Sepik Provincial Heath Authority, Donors and others to continue their services in the rural areas.
Samaritan Aviation CEO Mark Palm is optimistic that despite the challenges of rugged terrain, geographically and unstable weather conditions, and training of pilots to adapt to such situations, they will continue to deliver their free services to the people in remote areas to save lives.
