Alumni helps airlift food baskets to villagers
KOTA KINABALU: The alumni of the Layang-Layang Helicopter Academy is pitching in to help deliver food baskets to 110 families in Pitas.
These families are the ones stricken by the recent flood which have cut them off and jeopardized their access to food supplies.
One of the alumni members, Captain Shahdon Poong who is also the Group general manager of the Layang-Layang Group said that the families are from three neigbouring villages and they would be using one helicopter to carry out the airlifting of the food baskets to the affected villagers.
“We will be shuttling the food baskets from Pitas to Kampung Lok Dangkaan which is roughly about a half-hour journey by air. The people from the other two villages will collect their food supplies from Lok Dangkaan which is near to them,” he said.
He added that they could only take six food baskets per trip.
“So, we would be making more than eight trips altogether,” he said.
The operation would be carried out today (26 Jan) by Captain Khailaiselvan and Captain Sofia William.
“Prior to carrying out the operation, our crews must inspect the landing spot for the helicopter and they would be doing that today,” said Shahdon when met at the Layang-Layang Group office at Tanjung Aru here, yesterday.
He hoped for the operation to be completed in one day. Nevertheless, he also said this was dependent on the weather condition.
Shahdon also spoke of the alumni and explained that presently, there are five members altogether.
“We have young members,” he said.
Shahdon is only 24 years old and graduated in 2017. Other members of the alumni are Captain Nazeem Elezar, Captain Matthew Ian, Captain Amirul Asyraffe and the only lady in the team, Captain Sofia, who would be involved in the ferrying of the food baskets.
He added that this is the second of such an operation carried out by the alumni. The first one was carried out in March last year, where the members delivered food baskets to villagers in interior Penampang during the enforcement of the movement control order for the first time.
“The kampung people had to walk on foot for seven to eight hours and take a taxi to reach Donggongon, the nearest town to source their food supply needs. But during MCO, they returned empty handed as they were (police) checkpoints,” said Sofia.
Among the villages in Penampang where the team delivered food during the first round of MCO was Kampung Longkokungan.
“Our challenge then was the MCO. It is more challenging now because we are dealing with a flood situation.”
Aside from the LayangLayang Helicopter Academy alumni, the Malaysia Red Crescent Society (MRCS), the Landrover Club and Ranau G6 Club are also involved in the food delivery in Pitas.
MRCS chairman Remy Martin explained that there were altogether 800 over families needing food assistance in Pitas whereby 559 food baskets have been delivered. There are still 340 families waiting for the food assistance to arrive.
“We are delivering on land by 4WD. And for those unreachable and inaccessible on land, we will be using the service of LayangLayang Helicopter Academy alumni,” he said.
He said that some of the roads in Pitas are impassable even by 4WD due to landslides and muddy conditions.
The main coordinator of the operation, Fauziah Stephens said this was not the first time they carried out such an operation in Pitas.
She said they have begun distributing food to the afflicted in Pitas since the first MCO which occurred last year.
“We sourced for donors to help. We were able to help about 500 families. We didn’t expect that in nine months, we would be facing a similar predicament but more challenging due to the flood,” she said.
She added that many villages have been cut off by the flood, landslides and damaged roads.
“The government will need some time to rectify all that,” she said.
“We are grateful to LayangLayang because they came forward to offer their service. Where we are not able to reach, they can airlift. That is so important. Many of the villagers are finding it hard to go out and seek food.”