Avionics Repair Station

• Last year we shared this as a prayer request. An aviation inspector refused to renew our certified repair station to do electrical repair on our own aircraft. Your prayers are being answered!
• A senior director for civil aviation has taken an interest in our issue – and has shared their opinion that it was not handled appropriately by the inspector.
• Please pray for the next steps to resolve this problem to be made clear very soon.

Work Permits

• For the past two years four of our families were unable to renew their work permits. Again, God has answered these prayers! We have found someone who understands immigration, and has been able to guide our HR personnel to the correct channels to avoid some of these flags.
• In the meantime, the Government ministry over immigration, has created a new class of work permit. They specifically mentioned AIM pilots in the government bulletin that announced the new class of work permit. While this sounds like a good solution, the challenge is the new cost – which will be 10x more expensive than the traditional missionary work permit.

Lightning Strike

• One of our Caravans, 5Y-PYR (standing for “By Prayer”) was struck by lightning last year. The engine returned from the manufacturer’s facility this year. We have submitted an insurance claim, which is in process. We are so grateful for the AIRMAP Mission Aviation insurance program. They are always wonderful to work with. Praise God that the approval and insurance payment came quickly!

Mabawa Ya Injili (swahili for “Wings of the gospel”)

• This initiative continues to grow. This year we attended the inaugural missions conference for a large church founded in the 1940’s. They pledged to send 10 missionaries to a dangerous area in northern Kenya. Through Mabawa Ya Injili, we have been able to let churches know that when they send missionaries, or ministry teams, into these areas, we can support them, especially if they need to be evacuated. Our team went to six missions conferences throughout Kenya this year. Some times church members confess they hear the missionary reports and are scared to go visit them because it sounds so dangerous. We reassure them that the airplane can fly over the areas of insecurity and danger. One church has said they will never risk driving into some of these areas again now that they know we are ready to serve them with our aircraft!
  Next year we hope to put together a vision/ exposure trip for several mission minded churches to go on. We also hope to have a media person report on how this initiative is impacting local churches.

Remote Missionary Trips (RMS)

• Many missionaries in remote, difficult places have a calling and passion to serve people. They are gifted evangelists, teachers, or health works. They often don’t have the experience or time to deal with technical challenges that often interupt ministry. Meanwhile, AIM AIR missionaries typically have years of technical experience, and a desire to get out of the city, or even just get out of the airplane, and serve for a few days in these ministry locations.

Quality and safety managers

In 1975, AIM AIR started with a simple formula: missionary pilots and technicians who knew how to fly in remote areas and fix aircraft with whatever they could find. Back then, that’s all anyone needed to run an aviation ministry.

Times have changed. Regulations multiply like rabbits, and systems grow more sophisticated by the day. AIM AIR now needs more than just multitasking heroes (you know, those pilots who moonlight as safety managers or technicians who juggle quality management on the side). We need full-time missionaries dedicated to these roles – experts who can navigate Safety Management Systems and Quality Management Systems while running their own departments.

This shift represents quite the plot twist for us – after all, our missionaries originally signed up to fly planes or wield wrenches!

We ask you to join us in prayer, asking God to stir the hearts of the right people to fill these crucial and impactful positions at AIM AIR. And while you’re at it, spread the word far and wide.

Here’s the kicker: AIM AIR simply cannot take flight without these positions filled!

Financial Partners

You are a critical link in a lifeline that reaches deep in the most dangerous parts of the continent. Missionaries and pastors need you more than ever before so they can travel in safety and confidence to live among some of the world’s most forgotten communities.
Please pray for financial partners to join us in these three projects:

1. Strategic Flights and Development: Each dollar given subsidizies the cost of a Cessna 206 flight for one mile. 

2. Aircraft Upgrade Fund:  Over the next two years we will be overhauling two of our aircraft. This fund will allow us to make major upgrades to the aircraft, reducing the cost for missionaries to use the airplanes in the future.

3. Arua Hangar Project: Our goal is to move more of our maintenance capability to our Arua base. Arua is very close to where some of the most urgent needs are for mission aviation. A maintenance facility there will save missionaries money because there will be less overhead cost needed to reposition airplanes for maintenance. Aircraft there will also be better maintained for a quick response to emergency neeeds. 

Click on the buttons to read more about giving to AIM AIR

Hangar in Arua

Our goal is to move more of our maintenance capability to our Arua base. Arua is very close to where some of the most urgent needs are for mission aviation. A maintenance facility there will save missionaries money because there will be less overhead cost needed to reposition airplanes for maintenance. Aircraft there will also be better maintained for a quick response to emergency neeeds. 

Major Caravan Overhaul

Over the next two years we will be overhauling two of our aircraft. One of them has a required major inspection due this year. This provides opportunity to make some signifcant upgrades. 

Funds given to this project: will allow us to put more reliable avionics in the aircraft, and reduce the cost of operating the aircraft. This reduces the cost for missionaries to use our aircraft, while ensuring the aircraft are in a dispatch ready  state to respond to emergency flight requests.

Target: $200,000