Freemasons donate £16,000 to East Anglian Air Ambulance
Norfolk, Suffolk, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire Freemasons came together to pay an early Christmas visit to the East Anglian Air Ambulance base at Cambridge Airport and present grants totalling £16,000 from the MCF.
Over 3,000 life-saving journeys
East Anglian Air Ambulance (EAAA) provides a vital service, making almost 3,000 emergency journeys every year. Delivering a highly skilled doctor, critical care paramedic and specialist equipment as quickly as possible to the patient, this charity provides the very best in pre-hospital care to help save lives when every minute counts.
Over the last year, the EAAA teams attended 480 cardiac arrests, 355 road traffic collisions, 256 accidental injuries, 340 medical emergencies, 73 intentional self-harm incidents, 70 sporting incidents and 54 assault patients across the region.
At an estimated cost of £3,500 per mission, EAAA need to raise over £13 million a year to keep its two state-of-the-art helicopters flying, 365 days a year.
East Anglian Air Ambulance plans to expand their operations
Conor McGeown, Head of Development at the East Anglian Air Ambulance, said:
We’re hugely grateful to have the regular support of The Masonic Charitable Foundation, which has been making annual donations of £16,000 a year to EAAA for over ten years now, which makes a huge difference to our work.
The £4,000 donation from each province in the area that we cover is more than enough to fund a life-saving mission in each of our main counties, which is really significant. As we look to expand our operation to fly 24/7 from the end of next year, we need support from local organisations such as the Freemasons more than ever to make sure that we can be there for every patient that needs our support, day or night.
£2.4 million for air ambulance and rescue services
Since the scheme was established in 2007, a total of £2.4m has been donated across England and Wales. Many of the helicopters now display the square and compass logo on their tail rotas.
In isolated communities, speedy response by air ambulance and treatment from doctors during transfer is vital for those with serious and life threatening injuries.
