I’ve been enjoying your letters, and somehow they’ve brought back memories for me of traveling Oregon in a “chase truck” for fueling the helicopter.  It was my job to meet the helicopter at designated remote areas approximately every two and one half hours with fuel to keep them flying.  That necessitated a lot of prayer, since the directions wildlife biologists gave me were not very good.  Five miles to some corrals in south central Oregon, could turn out to be 15 miles, but I was very blessed to always have my prayers answered whenever I needed a little extra help. It was amazing, all I had to do was ask, and something or someone would appear to assist me in where I needed to be.

One spring time in particular, Philip was flying from Condon, Oregon to the Columbia River with two big Biologists who were counting waterfowl, when the helicopter coughed.  Not a good thing to happen when flying over hilly country with no good place to land, and miles from any civilization.  Philip’s main concern was for his passengers, so for their safety, he let them out to walk to a road.

I had fueled them in Condon, and was supposed to meet them in Pendleton, so had planned to head up to the freeway near the Columbia, but I felt impressed to take the roads toward Heppner or Lexington instead.  As I drove along Philip called me on the radio and told me the helicopter was not running right and he was going to let the biologists out so I was to pick them up.  Had I taken the other main road that communication could not have reached me; but the hills there are like miles and miles of a maze, and I was to find and pick up two guys out there somewhere.

Philip was using a GPS to fly a straight line to his destination, so I took out a map and estimated where I needed to go.  The only problems were that gravel back roads are not all on a map and in the hills trails are anything but straight, but I estimated where I needed to be and headed on, praying to find our big friends Brad and Mark.  Their size was also probably part of the reason for Philip’s caution of letting them out of the helicopter.  If the chopper should quit, heavier weight would make an autorotation in unlevel ground even more dangerous.

Along the way it began to rain.  Of course the roads were not marked, so I asked Heavenly Father to help me with directions.  Then in a draw, way out in what seemed like the middle of nowhere, was a farmer loading grain out of his grain bins.  I stopped in my one ton crewcab Chevy pickup and got out with my map pointing to where I thought I needed to go.  The Farmer gave me directions and on I went, taking the proper turns in the maze.

It wasn’t long until I came upon our two Biologists in their wet flight suits.  Surprised they said, “How did you find us?!  We called the office in Heppner, but our phone died.  How in the world did you find us?!!”

I’m sure I told them of my prayers and extra Special help.  They were very happy to get in out of the rain on that barren remote hill.

The rest of that story was that Philip landed the helicopter safely at the farm of another helicopter pilot near Lexington.  There we loaded it on a trailer and hauled it the rest of the way to Pendleton where it got a thorough going over by mechanics before flying again.

That’s my longest story of always finding where I needed to be. It was just as simple as prayer.

Love,

Ellen (Stevenson)