Nick DeRose has drilled scores of wells during his career as an environmental engineer but not any as valuable as those that his firm and others in the environmental consulting business are supporting for the Maasai people of Kenya. 

DeRose’s firm, Langan Engineering and Environmental Services, hosted a reception at their Doylestown, Pa offices on May 3 for the nonprofit MCEP (Maasai Cultural Exchange Project) which has funded the drilling of five, life-sustaining water wells for tribal villages of the Maasai people of Kenya in East Africa. 

DeRose was introduced to the organization by Rosemarie Williams, Langan’s Director of Business Development, who is a friend of MCEP’s co-founder, Phyllis Eckelmeyer.

Eckelmeyer knew nothing about the Maasai, their traditions, or their dependence on water (video) prior to a chance encounter she had several years ago after spotting several men, dressed in tribal garb, waiting for a train in Doylestown to take them to a meeting at the United Nations. 

Since she had a daughter who was about to take a teaching assignment at a school in Africa, she struck up a conversation. That led to a dinner invitation and eventually to the founding of MCEP. In its six-year history, the nonprofit has had notable success, not only in providing desperately needed water for the Maasai, but also in supporting educational and business initiatives for Maasai children and women.

Want to learn more? Check out the video below that we shot at the Langan event with DeRose, Eckelmeyer and Maasai tribesman John Sakuda.