Once in a while you meet someone who really makes sense, has a vision, knows how to tackle it, even if not solve it straight away .. but not afraid to try. Calvin Townsend’s been messing about on bikes all his life, along with his father & brothers. Its in his blood. After surviving
this Calv realised a few of life’s lessons and now not only runs the family business,
Vipex designing and manufacturing specialist vehicles and trailers but is planning a suitable transportation system to get a mobile health clinic around the rural areas of Kenya. 5 locations have been selected for the pilot run including Mwihila; located in Butere-Mumias District, Western Province of Kenya where 50% of the population is infected by HIV/AIDS & a whole generation is being wiped away. Thika; a slum area near Nairobi city, Winam about 375km from Nairobi & a new community being monitored via
NABUUR‘s online project management system,
Kayole-Soweto, in Nairobi’s Eastlands
Having researched some of the Riders for Health videos its clear that “only bikes can get through”. This only “pressed my challenge button“, Calvin scoffed. He’s now working on a converted six wheel drive landrover and looking at how to drive the wheels of the actual trailer too, giving the overall unit a 10 wheel drive capacity. “Flotation tyres might give us enough buoyancy to sort of drive/ float” over the common deep sands, rocks and mud (when the rains come).
Plan B is the PT44 truck on test with the Indonesian army Here is a clip of the truck in test… (don’t worry the “pretty” music soons toughens up as the truck does)
The 60% slope test is really impressive but I’ve no idea where the missiles went ???? Watch right to the end when it bow-waves the cameraman over !!!
Watch this space for progress on the project.
Technorati Tags: mobile health clinic, kenya, HIV, poverty, off-road, engineering
