Medical Flights to Sierra Madre

A group from the Arvada Rotary Club have flown into Guachochi, Mexico, for several years to bring medical aid and eye care to the community. Each trip seems to generate both adventure and a high sense of satisfaction of giving. Watch the documentary video above and/or read the back-story below.

Guachochi is a small community high in the Sierra Madre — at 8,000 feet, halfway between Mexico City and the Texas border, just minutes from the Copper Canyon. Jack Emery recruited volunteers to help with a humanitarian effort: flying small private planes into a short dirt airstrip to provide free eyeglasses, dental care, and other medical services to the indigenous Tarahumara and Hispanic Mexican communities.

Between 9 and 16 volunteers are flown or driven to Guachochi twice a year, each paying their own expenses. Over several years, the Rotarians have raised funds for fire and trash trucks, a school bus, and a library — and examined hundreds of patients per trip. Dr. Mitch Friedman offers dental services, and Rotarian Sharon Saquilon works to establish the town's first library.

Kent Gunnufson documented these trips over multiple years, producing the documentary film Medical Flights to Sierra Madre. The experience also generated a remarkable personal back-story — a night of survival in the Sierra Madre that Kent has called one of the most extraordinary experiences of his life.

Read the full account: Survival at Sierra Madre »