Vickness, a 44-year old Malawi native, had been told that the water in her village of Zolomondo was too deep to be extracted from the ground. She and everyone in her village only had access to a grimy well with water that was brown and dirty with sickness-inducing contaminants.
But in November 2013, Design Outreach, a Christian humanitarian engineering nonprofit organization (and one of the Grace Brethren cooperating organizations), installed the LifePump, an innovative deep-reaching and highly reliable hand pump, in her village of Zolomondo. Vickness told Design Outreach that, with access to water, she would build a brick home and start a vegetable garden.
Almost a year later, Design Outreach CEO Greg Bixler visited Vickness and her family. He was astonished to find that her dream had become a reality: a beautiful hand-built brick home large enough for her children and grandchildren. Because of the LifePump, others in her village had been able to start a brick-making business, plant gardens, and send their children to school regularly without reoccurring sicknesses due to contaminated water.
The LifePump had brought new life to the village of Zolomondo.
Lack of access to clean water is one of Africa’s biggest humanitarian needs. Design Outreach (DO) set out to change that. They started by installing two pumps and monitored them for over a year as they operated with no maintenance problems. Then they started making bigger plans.
They placed several new pumps last October and November in Malawi, Kenya, and Zambia. In 2014, Bixler and co-founder Abe Wright launched the Hundred Pump Project in collaboration with World Vision, aiming to bring clean water to hundreds of African villagers. With these in operation, DO is monitoring for full evaluation to insure that LifePump is the superior pump for all hand pump applications, especially for deep water situations.
You can find out more about Design Outreach’s projects and give by visiting their website. To learn more about Vickness and the life-changing power of water in the village of Zolomondo, click here and here.
This story first appeared in GraceConnect eNews. To subscribe to the weekly e-newsletter that includes news and information from congregations in the Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches, click here.