Friday, January 2, 2009

15 Seconds to the Ground

Falling, gathering velocity, cables whistling.

In relative silence the tower fell, its descent punctuated only by onlookers’ comments.

Cayo mal . . . cayo mal.” (It fell badly . . . it fell down wrong.”)


The transmission lines to a nearby antenna array were ripped down by the tower, but workers quickly repaired those lines for the next day's radio programming.


In 15 seconds it was over as the tower cut through the sky and crashed to the ground. Horizontal, mangled and bent, it belied the hundreds of man-hours invested decades earlier. At 416 feet tall, it had served as HCJB Global Voice’s tallest at the international transmitter site in Ecuador, and also the highest tower supporting the parabolic screen behind the steerable antenna.

Loud was the silence in the Andean pasture in a valley near Quito where the tower now lay on the grass. Loud also had been the signals emanating from its antenna, sending a powerful radio voice that proclaimed refuge, security and strength in Jesus Christ to people in distant locations: the Middle East, Japan, and the former U.S.S.R to name a few.

(Please see the full story at this blog site.)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Greetings hermano in the year of our Lord, 2009!
Wow, first the Shell guesthouse/hospital and now the Pifo site being dismantled.
Things change, verdad?

Thank God for your faithfulness in proclaiming the one who never changes, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end!

We thank our God on our every remembrance of your family, the ministry and the lives that are being impacted for His name sake!
Yours in Christ, Dave

Serve the Lord with gladness.
Dave and Mary

http://aboxofcurtains.blogspot.com