The London Freemasons support London’s Air Ambulance Charity’s fundraising campaign with pledge of £3 million
The London Freemasons have committed to raising £3 million for London’s Air Ambulance Charity.
The charity is in the midst of its largest ever appeal, “Up Against Time”, to raise £15 million by Autumn 2024 to replace its helicopter fleet.
The cornerstone funding kicks off the purchase and deployment of the helicopters and brings the charity a huge step closer to their £15 million fundraising target.
London’s Air Ambulance Charity is proud to announce that the London Freemasons, long-term supporters of the charity, have pledged to make the largest single donation of their helicopter fundraising appeal “Up Against Time”.
With its existing helicopter fleet becoming increasingly challenging to maintain, the charity has been seeking to raise the £15 million required to purchase and deploy two new Airbus H-135s and the Freemasons’ pledge helps to cover a fifth of those costs.
London’s Air Ambulance is a service that receives 96% from public support and the Up Against Time campaign marks the charity’s largest ever fundraising push.
When patients are so seriously injured there is no time to reach hospital, London's Air Ambulance medics give life-saving treatment at the scene, attending nearly 2000 missions last year.
The Freemasons have had a long-standing relationship with the charity and their support over the years has enabled the service to be there for approximately 11,000 Londoners since 2016.
Along with their latest pledge, their past support helped the charity purchase the second of its two helicopters and update their fleet of rapid response cars.
Jonathan Jenkins, CEO, London’s Air Ambulance Charity said:
“As a charity, we rely almost entirely on donations, so when we launched the fundraising campaign for our two new helicopters we were under no illusion as to the scale of the challenge.
We’ve been blown away by the levels of support from communities across London but we knew that a large-scale cornerstone donation would be vital to help reach our £15 million target.
The London Freemasons have been a hugely supportive and valued partner over the years, most notably helping us during our previous helicopter fundraising campaign in 2016, and for them to accelerate our fundraising with such a large cornerstone amount is nothing short of transformational.
On behalf of the whole charity, I would like to pass on my gratitude and appreciation to everyone involved in making this happen.”
Sir Michael Snyder, Leader, London Freemasons said:
“London’s Air Ambulance Charity is absolutely vital, bringing emergency medical experts to the roadside in rapid time and saving lives every day across London.
The Freemasons have supported London’s Air Ambulance over the last eight years because it is an essential part of keeping London safe and we hope our pledge today will help this continue for many years to come.
London’s Air Ambulance Charity is one of those organisations where volunteers, experts and paid staff come together to make a genuinely life-changing difference to our city and I am proud to continue to support such a cause.”