This month we have had the privilege of working with Mercy Ships on the M/V Mercy Africa and 500ft train ferry from Denmark that has been converted into a floating modern hospital. They travel West Africa, setting up shop for 6 to 10 months at a time offering free surgeries and health care to the local people. They focus on surgeries that will offer a better quality of life to the people who receive them. Cataract removal, tumor removal, cleft palate repair, dental services all free of charge to people that would never have an opportunity to get these things corrected. It is an amazing organization that helps hundreds of people every week.
I have been working with the engineering department gathering data on the old air conditioning system on board. The hospital and some of the living quarters have a new A/C system that was installed when Mercy Ships converted the train ferry to a hospital. But much of the ship is still on the old system that has been in service since the ship was built 30yrs ago, which was designed to work in Denmark, not Africa, so the system has a hard time keeping up when the weather is hot. And because the ship is a big metal box with no windows that open, you have to have A/C or the ship can’t function. So I have been spending my days walking all over the ship taking temperature readings of the rooms and the various parts of the A/C system and compiling all those into a spread sheet that will be used to make a report that will get passed up the ladder for approval. And then its just a matter of fund-raising the millionish dollars to make it all happen. It has been a great month for me getting to go all over the ship seeing almost every nook and cranny of this unique vessel.
