Posted By Wes Cowley on March 3, 2010
Haven’t traveled much lately, so thought I would upload a few pictures from old trips. This trip to Chicago occurred in September of 2005. We went to Hammond, In for a wedding then drove up to Chicago to visit my sister and her family. We stayed in town, and these pictures are from Grant Park, and from a Architectural Boat Tour. The weather was lousy, but managed to get some good shots.
Posted By Wes Cowley on October 5, 2009
As of 5:30 PM in Honduras, the drill stem in still stuck in the hole. They are getting very little rotation because they are getting no circulation of air or anything through the plugged up drill stem. Tomorrow they are going to deattach the drill stem, send a half inch pipe down through the stem and put 200 lbs of pressure (I think that is the number he quoted) down through the pipe and try to clear the drill stem.
Pray for success and pray for the rock the stem is sitting on to give up easily when they get the stem cleared.
Posted By Wes Cowley on October 4, 2009
Saturday as I said in my last post, the drilling crew pumped the mud out of the well. They had a problem at one time getting the mud out, but finally cleared the blockage, and continued. At about 160-170 feet going back in pumping the mud out, it looked as if there was some water coming up. Not putting any air down, the well still blew out a mud and water mixture. Water was coming from someplace, and they had already drilled through that depth. It could have been that the mud sealed off the hole as it went down, and blocked the seemingly minor source of water. About that time a problem arose with an O-Ring on the drill head, and they stopped work for the day after pulling the pipe out. This morning, Sunday, there was about 70 feet of water in the hole. Water coming from somewhere, but apparently not much flow.
They fixed the drill head and proceeded down again. Between 210 and 220 feet, the drill bit got stuck in or on a rock. While trying to jiggle it loose, a hydraulic hose split, bringing operations to a halt again.
The hose vibrated against the housing of the control panel until a hole wore through it. A new hose would have to be made Monday and brought back from Teguz. In the meantime, the team would inspect all the other hoses for damage. And, 220 feet of drill stem were stuck in the hole. Hopefully operations would resume sometime late Monday.
On a somewhat negative, yet positive note, even if we don’t hit water, we have provided employment for a few of the men from the village while trying. And the same is true for the renovations to the church. Without this infusion of money, they would likely have no work. Keeping this in mind as an excuse for my behavior (or misbehavior) after delivering food to families in San Lorenzo (paid for by the Good Shepherd Episcopal Church of Central Florida), I decided to do the same for the families in our parish in Moroceli. I purchased 22 bags of food for a list provided by Myra, wife of Rev. Carlos, and delivered them Sunday morning. Total cost about $224 U.S.
I realize I will probably face a disciplinary review hearing in front of my Council upon my return, but so be it, I make a good martyr.
Seriously, the drilling operations of the group from Texas do provide badly needed employment for Hondurans as well as the obvious result of proving clean water. I know it is the dream of some of the members of the Texas Water Ministry to be able to drill on a more continuous basis. The benefits are readily apparent, as is the command from The Holy Spirit.
I’ll post some more as well as some pictures later.
Posted By Wes Cowley on October 3, 2009
Well is at 210 feet as of yesterday afternoon. This morning, Saturday, October 3, they are going to pump the mud out of the well, dry it out, and go back in with the air hammer. Keep praying, I believe water is down there.
Posted By Wes Cowley on October 1, 2009
Woke this morning to noisy rufous-naped wrens outside the window. For small birds they make a racket.. Left for Moroceli about 7:30 this morning (Thursday, Oct. 1) and arrived to find the rig idle. Water was the problem drilling for water. To back up a couple of days, when I got to Moroceli Monday, I found Rev. Carlos standing by the pila (water tank) in the church yard. Water from flowing in from the municipal water system, which water comes from the rivers and creeks nearby. My pint is, if I have one, is the Rev. Carlos said that there had been no water for three weeks, and it started flowing about an hour before I got there. Delivery of this dirty surface water is very spotty even in the summer rainy season, and often non-existent in the dry season. This morning, there was no water in the pila, and none flowing. So, the team had to fill up huge plastic water tanks and transport them from the river. Nobody said it was going to be easy.
Rather than watch the idle rig, I went to Danli, met up with Jeannie Loving and loaded up 40 bags of food and forty bags of hygiene necessities, for San Lorenzo. Also three bags of cement for the park under construction in San Lorenzo. They may not have any food, and the well doesn’t work, but they are going to have a fine park for the children. San Lorenzo is a terribly poor village of 40 families. In August, 2008, a tropical storm parked over Honduras for several days, and washed away all the crops in San Lorenzo and other communities. The people survived only by the efforts of charitable organizations. This year, the Texas Water Ministry donated $1000 of seed corn, and the people of San Lorenzo are eating a lot of corn these days thanks to a bumper crop.
A bag of food, rice, beans, etc. costs 127.5L., $6 at $18.5L to the dollar. A week’s worth of food maybe for a family of 4. Another ministry for my Council in Lakeland. We buy it, we can get it delivered to Moroceli. The food is purchased from Sami, a Palestinian Christian who has several business in Danli. Sami gives a large discount on the food, and packages it for free.
Here are some kids from San Lorenzo.
 
During our trip to Honduras in April, we visited San Lorenzo and I put a pic in this blog of a young girl carrying water. I commented that she was either pregnant or maybe had some other problem, such as worms. She is not pregnant, the picture on the right below is today, left in April. She has a problem of some sort, and her parents will not take her to the doctor, probably because they cannot afford it. I’d love to find the money to get an exam and help the young lady find and cure her problem.
Back to business, I returned to Moroceli, and they were drilling with mud.
New work on the templo:

They hit rock at 170 feet, and pulled back Thursday afternoon. Friday morning, they loaded the diamond drill and tried getting through the rock. that was the status when I left about 10:30 AM Friday. My next entry will update the status.
