To continue our ongoing mission program, I returned to Liberia during Feb and March of 2015. This trip had several goals. Initially we visited the installations for Sis Iye (named after its founder, Sister Iye) Orphanage and school in Monrovia and the MODUC (Mission for Orphaned, Disabled, and Unclaimed Children) Orphanage in Buchanan, both in Liberia. These orphanage installations were completed in 2014 and we did the final tuning and training for these installations and planned for the improvements which would allow for water pumping and refrigeration to be added. Battery issues were addressed at the MODUC clinic. These orphanages and schools serve approximately 50-60 children, and Sis Iye has a sewing and cloth-making school. At Sis Iye they presented me with a hand-made shirt made from their hand-made cloth.

I then traveled to Bong County and finalized the installations for 3 additional clinics in the communities of Weinsue, Nyarta and Tokpaipolu. There we completed the training for the clinic staff and addressed their future power needs. We returned to Weinsue later and implemented a water pumping project at the site—our first pumped water system in Liberia with our clinic systems. This experiment worked very well (pumping approximately 100 gal of water in 45 minutes) and the data that we collected will allow us to plan for additional water pumping projects at these clinics.

I then sat down with the Community Health Department staff and we discussed their goals for improvements at the clinics. As the clinics are getting larger the amount of energy being utilized is increasing proportionately, and clean water is important for proper sanitation at these facilities. Additionally, many of these clinics are becoming permanently staffed on a 24 hour basis, adding additional power requirements. We targeted several of our existing facilities for expansion as well as the addition of 6-7 additional clinics (final details to be determined). These new installations and expansions will be installed in 2015 thanks to a grant through Brother’s Brother Foundation (Pittsburgh) and the efforts of Bob Peirce, a Pittsburgh attorney.