If you were one of the several thousand Masai people living in Longido, Tanzania near the Serengeti Plain, your sources for water were seasonal ponds or open wells, most of which were shared with wild and domestic animals and contaminated with harmful bacteria and parasites. The result? Uniform childhood dysentery and high infant mortality from drinking this water. Locals also suffered from varied GI diseases and blindness as there was no clean water for washing hands and eyes.
Enter the Jacksonville-Applegate Rotary Club. In order to make best use of resources, our goal was to find a good well that had been drilled, but never completed. Michel Mantheakis—brother of our member Platon Mantheakis, and a native of Tanzania—found a well that was sufficiently deep, had good production capacity, and had passed testing for harmful bacteria. Our Club provided the funding, and the Mantheakis family, along with local contractors, built platforms, installed tanks, and equipped the well with a pump, piping, and a solar array to power the pump. Water is pumped into holding tanks, then into a public spigot for collection by residents.
In April, 2019, club members were able to travel to Tanzania where they were honored by the people who now have clean water for drinking, cooking, and washing up.