Federai Project Web Site

Preface

I don’t do web pages!  I don’t do web pages!!!  Except when I have  to design a page to teach my technology students a web concept.  However, the Oceania Community Health project for Federai Island is too cool to not document.  It is my intent to post articles and pictures daily or every other day as we proceed with setting up the equipment at the community school.

The number of pictures will be limited because they will be uploaded along with the text via at satellite phone.  Each picture will cost about $4.00 to upload to this web page.

The top picture shows most of our project team.  The next two pictures are of the Federai PV power plant with will supply 28kw of power.  There are already power feeds to the new dispensary and the school as well as to various other places on the island.  So the good news is that we have power.  The bad news is that it is European flavored power which will fry U.S. equipment if its not stepped down.  To solve the problem, we purchased a nice heavy, hernia producing stepdown power transformer from the mainland.  It, along with the other 20 crates of equipment shipped out to Yap several weeks ago.

The pictures below the preface section are of members of the team along with some of their family members.

July 6, 2011

I got the sat phone yesterday and did part of the setup.  I’m working on setting up the data port now so that the web updates can be posted.  Marcie is on her way over to help make up the packets of candies that will be presents for the kids on Federai.  We also got 4 large bags of animal crackers for the kids.  We also have a large box full of bags of Hawaiian coffee for the adults in the community.

The satellite phone’s data port runs much slower than Iridium advertises – I spent most of the day and burned up $120 of air time trying to get it tamed enough to upload pictures – to get it to upload, I’m having to make the pictures even smaller.  I still haven’t tried it with email.  I probably would have been better off using the time to pack.

July 7, 2011

I spent most of the day finishing final shopping for the trip.  It took until 1 AM to get everything that needed to go to somehow fit in the space available.  I won’t know until I get to Federai whether I over or under packed.  As I went through the packing marathon I started really wondering what I’ve gotten myself into!  Tomorrow we hit the road.

July 8, 2011

On-line checkin for Hawaiian ran fine.  Online checkin for Continental wants your passport number and everything else and then won’t print your boarding pass at the end – you need to have your passport scanned before you’ll get anything.

I checked the bag and the boxes of presents in at Hawaiian, but they had to figure out how to check them through to Yap.  The really smart and helpful lady at Hawaiian not only got everything checked all the way through, but she coaxed the system into coughing up boarding passes for Guam and Yap!  Off we go.  Met up with Juan and Raven at the Continental gate in Honolulu.  After going through all of the passport control points at their gate, my new passport is almost worn out.

The flight to Guam is about 7 ½ hours and isn’t bad.  They have a  moving map on the video display to keep all the adults from asking “are we there yet?”.  As I finish up this section, Juan, Raven, and I are sitting at the gate in Guam waiting for Max and the flight to Yap.  After crossing the International Dateline, I’m now a day late and a thousand dollars short.