Volunteers donate 45,340 minutes of time to the Great North Air Ambulance Service

GNAAS currently have over 100 regular volunteers as part of their ‘ground crew’, who dedicate their spare time representing the charity. Whether it’s delivering presentations to the public, manning stalls at summer shows, or emptying collection boxes, they help in numerous ways to support the cause.

Sophie Snowdon, fundraising lead at GNAAS, said: “Since March 2023 we’ve been using a volunteer management app which allows us to easily track the number of hours worked by our volunteers.

"The total for last year was 45,340 minutes, and this includes volunteers helping out at events such as our annual charity balls in the North East and Cumbria, bucket collections, community talks, stalls, and also admin at our HQ, such as helping with our annual raffle.

“We also have a wonderful team of volunteers who empty our collection tins, which are often on display in shops, pubs and workplaces across the region. Currently we are unable to track the hours for this activity, which means our volunteers have actually exceeded the 755 hours we have on record.”

The charity is currently seeking to expand their team of volunteers, and are recruiting for people to help empty their collection tins in the North East.

GNAAS relies on public donations and needs to raise more than £8m every year to survive. Last year, it responded to more than 2,000 call outs.