Another site on the air in Peru – Sicuani FM. Another move for us. And Feliz Navidad!

I worked (remotely) with Diospi Suyana to launch our 8^th FM site to reach the city of Sicuani.  It’s a southern Peru city of some 60,000 people situated at an elevation of 3,549 metres.  

There were many, many obstacles to overcome with this site.  Firstly we had to choose a site on the opposite side of town to the other broadcast towers, as the rural community who managed this parcel of land would not allow Diospi Suyana to purchase our needed 12m x 12m lot.  This meant we needed to install our own 1km long power line with 13 poles (very expensive!) and we are still awaiting its connection to the Peru power grid (Electro Sur).  Sicuani is currently going to air using a temporary generator.

13 power poles and over 1km of line all installed by manual labour (no machines here!).

For this site we chose a 50 metre high tower (more expense) to increase the coverage and overcome some local obstacles.  From our computer desktop coverage prediction of the radio signal, we calculate a reach of over 120,000 people for Sicuani and surrounds.

Sicuani FM site with 50m tall tower during antenna installation.

 

Computer FM coverage prediction for Sicuani.

If not enough heartaches, just when we went to switch on Sicuani FM, we had satellite interference issues at the same time as some uplink equipment failures. I spent many nights and weekends from October through November assisting Diospi Suyana to help fix the problems remotely from my office in Canberra.  We attempted an internet feed for the radio program, but not surprisingly for Peru’s perpetually developing network, this proved frustratingly unreliable and satellite was the only option.

But perseverance and prayer prevailed and we are now on air!☺ This brings the total covered to over a million FM listeners for Diospi Suyana 24 x 7 x 365 days a year.  We believe this fulfils the original prophecy over Chris in LifeSource Christian Church back in 1996 (see our first blog here).

The second of one of my new design DB FM transmitter racks I had built for Diospi in Italy.

Life always has surprises just waiting around the corner for us. God's plans are always being revealed.

For our family, 2021 is to be known as our Canberra year. We boarded at YWAM Canberra for 11 months and were blessed to experience community living.  It was at its best during our state COVID lockdown when our household community was 50+ people and our kids had a huge 6 hectare property to play on, with another 5 sport loving kids who became firm friends.

We did really enjoy our Canberra church, Fusion City Church, Canberra cycling and bush-city vibe.

But in the second half of 2021, God started to open a new door for us. Chris was given much favour at work and a simple enquiry on our behalf turned into a new employment position for him as a communications engineer contracting to our Navy with his company Nova Systems in Perth. He is on a project upgrading communications systems on our eight ANZAC Class frigates.

Sandi's immediate family reside in Perth all near the Naval base, making this an exciting new chapter for all of us.

God went before us at every step. The move to Western Australia has been easy. We were able to all get WA G2G Passes (permission to enter Western Australia) thru Chris’ new position given his critical work for the Navy.  From Canberra we bought a house in Perth (not our normal online shopping purchase! J). We are yet to see the house in person as we are currently in the required 14 day COVID quarantine at Sandi’s parents’ house.  

We will miss our family and friends in the east. This includes our eldest son Jake who is living in Sydney.

Our 20ft shipping container is collected from YWAM Canberra destined for Perth.

Our family in Canberra airport excitedly ready for the adventure ahead.

 

We touched down in our new home of Perth on 9 December.

When we returned from Peru in 2019, our aim was to buy a house so we would have a family base. It has been a different journey to what we anticipated, but we are sure God is directing our steps.

Please pray for us as our family transitions again to a new place.

🎄 Feliz Navidad! (Merry Christmas!) 🎄

 Love and blessings,

 Chris & Sandi Xx

Abancay FM On Air

Tuesday 31 Aug 2021

On Saturday 7 August we saw the culmination of a lot effort dragged out in slow motion over some 18 months due to trying circumstances – the most notable being COVID-19 of course.  This resulted in extended lockdowns of which Peru has some of the strictest in the world (but that’s another story).  Not to mention our main installation technician, Luis Condori (who during my last 2 years in Peru I instructed to install to my standards), contracted the virus himself whilst in Lima and was out of action for over a month.

Diospi Abanacy FM tower is the centre tallest tower banded red and white.

The city of Abancay 1,700 m below. Our FM reaches this valley and beyond.

Diospi Suyana also encountered extended delays with the Peru power authority Electro Sur, who needed to make the electrical connection to our 4,077 m high mountain top site needing many new poles, a transformer and wires.  I had provided all my installation drawings (in Spanish) to the team on the ground in Peru, including; site construction drawing including tower earthing, electrical system line drawing, transmitter equipment rack layout, wiring block diagram, satellite antenna drawing etc.

But in the end, perseverance prevailed and our latest FM 92.7 MHz was launched to reach the city of Abancay and its surrounds!

Abancay is a thriving bustling city built on a mountainside slope, with town centre at 2,377 m above sea level.  Our coverage extends beyond Abancay itself to reach our computer predicted population of 136,000 FM listeners in the region.

There are a number of things needing completion including our satellite telemetry which is something only I can do, and the security system install that monitors and control all the transmission equipment at the site.  But those things will need to wait for a future opportunity for my return to Peru.

Following is a brief photo montage of this, our 7^th FM site in Peru.

Assembling the satellite antenna for Diospi audio signal reception.

The final connections made to the electrical transformer.

My colleague, Peru technician Luis Condori, who installed my new generation FM rack (built to my design in Italy).

Chris providing support (viz. calling the shots ☺) from home in Canberra.

Our computer prediction of our Abancay FM coverage

So another satisfying result.  The next Diospi FM site, Sicuani, is also nearing completion to allow a similar installation to take place, likely in the next month or so.

Thank you for those that still support us by prayer to enable this good work to miraculously continue.

Chris

Our Mission on Hold

Dear friends and family,

This blog is the hardest to write.  At the same time it’s ok because we are excited and so grateful when we remember all that God has done thru our Peru mission.  

God has made a way for the Diospi Suyana media centre to reach 850,000 people in remote Peru daily with the gospel message via radio 24/7.

As you know we were home in Sydney on furlough in April 2019 with intent to return to Peru for nine months in 2020, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic this was not possible.  Chris continued with the Diospi Suyana satellite/radio work from Australia and undertook some irregular paid engineering contracting work in Sydney.

As time went on we had to accept that no return to Peru would be able to be organised in the near future. We prayed for God’s next step for us (and many of you did too) and God answered with full time employment for Chris in Canberra.

Thus we have made the decision to place our mission officially “on hold” until we can make further plans to return to Peru.

The funds that have been given to our mission are held in full with Pioneers awaiting our return trip. We are so ever grateful to those of you that have hung in with us to this time, and for those that have supported our mission in the past and for those that pray for us. Thank you!

This all means that with a ‘hold’ status on our mission, we will not be accepting anymore donations thru OARF or our family support account.

The Pioneers Australia team have written a letter they asked us to pass onto you all from them…

“We would like to extend to you a heartfelt thank you for all your prayers and financial support for the Welch family over the past almost five years, as they have ministered in Peru at Diospi Suyana with Pioneers (both on-site and while back in Australia). The family have made the difficult decision to remain in Australia and take up paid employment for this current season. Whilst Chris has been doing consulting work remotely over the past two year for Diospi Suyana to ensure their radio transmission sites continued to broadcast, this will reduce to a few hours a week at night and on the weekends.

Your continued care and prayers for them will be much appreciated as they adjust to their life in Canberra.

Financial Support: For those who have been financially supporting the Welch family, please note that support gifts should stop before the 1st March 2021.

• If we withdraw your payments through direct debit or credit card, we will automatically stop these on the 28th February 2021.
• If you arrange your own payments through your online banking or by cheque, you will need to stop your payments.

If you have any questions about your support, or if you are interested in supporting another Pioneers worker, you can contact our finance team at info@pioneers.org.au or Freecall 1800 78 78 89.

Yours in Christ,

Pioneers Finance team”

We are in Canberra now, our hearts filled with thankfulness for the blessings and love you have shown us, in obedience to God’s call for you to help with his work.

You can be assured that the Diospi Suyana Media Centre has 2 more FM transmission sites already underway and God willing Chris is very keen to help get them going!  We will stay in touch.

Grateful, Thankful, Blessed by and for you all.

Love, The Welch family

Our Satellite Network Frequency Change in Peru

Friday 29 Jan 2021

After arriving in Canberra in the week I had before starting work at Nova Systems, took to remotely managing a necessary satellite frequency retune for the Diospi Suyana radio network in Peru.  As there were no other satellite engineering expertise available.  It was a mandatory requirement of the satellite operator Intelsat to shuffle services up in our satellite band, as they make way for 5G in the Americas (the same thing is happening all over the world in all similar satellite bands in fact).

So after 3 midnight to dawn efforts, managing 3 teams of people on the ground in Peru (a combination of Diospi Suyana people and contractors) up to 800km apart by road, we successfully executed this for all 7 of our satellite sites.  This was a precarious feat to say the least, as if anything went wrong, the signal outage could be very lengthy and difficult to remediate without engineering hands on access to the right equipment.  But due to COVID-19 this trip for me was not an option.

So from the comfort of our new dwelling place at YWAM in Canberra, I was able to remotely log into the needed sites via a secure internet link.  This enabled me to directly make the necessary frequency changes to those sites including the main satellite uplink site at the Centro de Medios at the hospital in Curahuasi.  I gave instruction by email step by step instructions (in Spanish) and also WhatsApp messages and video real time, to the remote teams.

But clearly God was with us as it went without any serious problems and the Diospi Suyana radio network outage was minimal.

Here I am managing the satellite retune from my Canberra bedroom both via WhatsApp and email with the teams and directly via secure internet link into the Diospi Suyana equipment in Peru.

One of my colleagues in Peru – contractor Luis Condori, who was one of our remote site teams helping with the satellite retune.

The Centro de Medios main satellite uplink antenna at the hospital in Curahuasi.

Here is my latest Diospi Suyana FM radio coverage map in Peru, all 8 sites which includes the 2 new sites of Abancay and Sicuani that is soon to commence when COVID-19 restrictions are lifted to allow us to undertake the transmitter installations.

With the satellite frequency change complete – the next stage for Diospi Suyana radio now is the launch of the next 2 FM radio sites of Abancay and Sicuani.  Those sites are now constructed with the towers, buildings and 3m high secure walls completed.  We only await the installation of the FM transmission equipment.  However COVID-19 in Peru has worsened in these regions and there is a Government curfew in place that prevents any work.  This includes the electrical authority, Electro Sur, from making the power connection to these sites with the poles, wires (up to 800 metres) and transformers.

Diospi Suyana Abancay FM site with 30m tower ready for power and FM transmission equipment.

It is hoped that in the next month (April), this curfew will be lifted to enable the final works to be completed. I have arranged the FM transmission and satellite equipment is to be installed by an engineering contractor from Lima who I have given my design documentation packs to having worked with him when I was in Peru and I trust (Luis Condori).  As presented previously, I have also had all this FM and satellite transmission equipment prepared (pre-built and wired in the factory including the equipment rack) and delivered to Diospi Suyana hospital, to make the installation as simple and as easy as possible.

So when completed, the Diospi Suyana radio coverage will then exceed 1 million people (24 x 7 x 365) per our original prophecy some 25 years ago.  How amazing that will be! (I believe there will be up to 1 million very grateful people in Peru J).

Thank you for those who have contributed to this good work and supported us in so many ways to make it possible!

Chris

Our Move to Canberra

One hot summer’s day we arrive in Canberra (Saturday 23 January 2021)

To our dear Supporters,

We had our best move ever!  After a perfectly executed logistical exercise involving a hire truck and 3 trips to to/from Canberra, we finally made our move to Canberra with all the family on Saturday 23 January.  We were helped by good friends (thank you – you know who you are!) at each end with packing, loading / unloading and for one trip, even a driver.  

Another hire-truck load destined for Canberra.

Our driver Willie Strauss and Sam take our 3rd and last hire truck load to Canberra.

Isaac and old Canberra friend Stuart McMaster helping pack our storage shelves in our Queanbeyan unit.

Sorting the last of our household things to go.

YWAM Canberra.

We were not able to secure a rental house in the competitive January real estate market but in answer to prayer, friends of ours pointed us to the Canberra YWAM base.  We have been able to move in to our own demountable little house on their grounds. We are blessed to be able to stay here as long as we need to. We have now settled in here with our household things in storage at nearby Queanbeyan.  We are enjoying the community living experience and it has been wonderful to maintain a mission connection in YWAM.

And so we are writing to you now a month later - after one new job for me, a new school (Y11) for Isaac, a new Uni for Sam, a work weekend away to Jindabyne, a bike crash for Sam with a visit to the hospital L, meeting new friends, looking for a new church, finding our way around a new city… and I guess if we thought about it enough, the list would go on infinitum.

Thank you for your love and support,

Chris Sandi & our clan