Great Western Air Ambulance Charity raising funds to buy their new air base

Great Western Air Ambulance Charity (GWAAC) is appealing to the local community to help raise the vital funds needed to buy their new air base.

Their current air base in Filton is one of the oldest in the country, and unfortunately is no longer meeting the needs of the increasingly busy service. Added to this, the entire site is set to be re-developed, and will no longer be able to host the service..

Luckily their current landlords, BAE Systems, is building a new air base in Almondsbury for the charity, which will provide a modern home for the life-saving service and which GWAAC will move into before the end of 2018.

In an exciting move, BAE Systems have given the charity the opportunity to buy the new base once it’s completed – at a significantly lower price than it cost them to buy the land and build the facilities – thus providing GWAAC with stability for the foreseeable future.

The GWAAC crew attend on average 5 incidents every single day, providing cutting edge Critical Care at the scene of an accident or medical emergency.

The charity provides the Critical Care and Air Ambulance service to 2.1 million people across the counties of Bath and North East Somerset, Bristol, South Gloucestershire, Gloucestershire, North Somerset and surrounding areas. They receive no day-to-day funding from the Government or National Lottery.

The team consists of highly skilled Critical Care Doctors and Specialist Paramedics in Critical Care, who are able to carry out life-saving interventions such as blood transfusions, and administer anaesthetics, at the scene of an incident – in effect bringing the skills you would usually find in an Accident & Emergency department to your garden, the roadside, a park or your home.

The new air base will cost GWAAC £2 million to buy, and they are asking you to help them raise £1 million towards this, plus £250,000 to fully kit it out. That is in addition to the £3 million needed by GWAAC each year to stay operational.

To find out more and donate to the Buy Our Base appeal visit: www.buyourbase.co.uk