MSDN evangelist goes airborne to shuttle food, supplies
Bill Steele, Indiana-based MSDN developer evangelist and a longtime private pilot, saw a need and responded. His workload of presentations had a two-week open window, and he decided to offer his time and his own plane (a twin-engine Piper Seneca 3), to shuttle food and supplies to needed areas. FEMA agreed to pay for his gas. This past Sunday (Sept. 4), he filed this e-mail:
“I'm flying out of Baton Rouge International ... and have so far moved enough meals to feed about 6,000 people. When I say meal, I mean MRE (Meal Ready to Eat). I've been reacquainting myself to them, as well. I forgot how good some of them were. I've also been delivering bottled water and some medical supplies. My plane can handle about 700 meals with a bottle of water each and a couple boxes of medicines each trip. (That puts me slightly over gross [weight allowance], but who's counting – we do remove the meals from the cardboard boxes to lighten the load a bit, and I only get about 50 gallons of fuel, since each trip is less then 1 hour.)
Most of my flights have been to the lower part of Mississippi, which was just hammered. I flew into one airport that was so badly damaged that I literally landed on an access road, because the runway didn't exist. The control tower actually fell over from the wind. I did a small tour of the coastline to assess damage (I've had relief coordinators with me on every flight) and it's shocking to see the magnitude of damage.
Anyway, the food deliveries are actually winding down because either the people are leaving or they now have "ground transportation of goods" which means that I'll move into a new type of role shuttling medical supplies and people. (I removed the seats from my plane so we're going to have to reinstall them as well.) There are about 50 planes doing this work and we're all running about six or seven trips a day. We've got good sleeping quarters – a nearby Holiday Inn and plenty of food.”
Bill’s actions – by Sept. 7, he had delivered 17,500 meals – have made his group very proud, said manager Michael O’Neill. “I thought there was no way [government officials] were going to let him do any [flying]. He’s found a niche,” O’Neill said. To learn more about Bill Steele, visit his blog or Web site.
This is just one example of how the employee's at Microsoft are showing their compassion for the people in Mississippi and Louisiana and trying to help get them back on their feet. We have a National team that is working through the Las Colinas, Texas office to coordinate our efforts in Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio too. It's made me proud to be part of this company to see so many people that are willing to help our bretheren in their time of need.