Fr Joe with two of the Russian flying crew

With a little help from the United Nations, Fr Joe Brown SDB was able to take Maureen Devereux to visit the village of Tappita, where her son, Sean Devereux, worked during part of his stay in Liberia.

Mrs Devereux was in Liberia at the beginning of February 2006, together with Sally Hounsham of the Sean Devereux Children's Fund to see some of the projects she supports and to take part in the celebrations for the Centenary of the Catholic Church in Liberia.

The journey to Tappita would have taken most of a day over very rough roads, but Fr Joe discovered just in time that the United Nations had a helicopter 'going that way'. (There happened to be a Salesian Past Pupil from the Philippines in a senior position with the 15,000 strong UN Peacekeeping Mission in Liberia.) After dropping off some UN personnel in Ganta, the Russian flight crew headed for Tappita and waited for their passengers during the ceremonies before returning them safely to Monrovia.

Fr Joe Brown worked in Liberia for 21 years and now runs the Don Bosco Missions Office in Battersea.

A full account of this visit to Liberia was included in the Autumn 2006 edition of Don Bosco Today.