The £6m Airbus H145 aircraft is now fully operational following the completion of crew training and a full medical fit-out.

It is based at Yorkshire Air Ambulance’s northern air base at RAF Topcliffe, near Thirsk, and completes the replacement of the rapid response emergency service’s two, ageing MD902 Explorer aircraft.

Last September the first H145 went into service, flying from the charity’s air support unit at Nostell, near Wakefield.

The new helicopters offer exceptional flight performance and will have significantly lower operational and maintenance costs. The H145 is night capable, enabling longer flying hours, and offers a much larger cabin area to treat patients in flight.

The region’s air ambulance doctors and paramedics have been involved from the start in the fit out of the H145s which will also carry the latest medical equipment.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance has planned the replacement of its increasingly costly, ageing aircraft for several years. The £12m cost has been met through planned savings, grants, careful budgeting and the amazing generosity of the people of Yorkshire.

YAA Chairman Peter Sunderland said: “To see the second helicopter in operation is hugely exciting and a very proud day for us as a charity and for the people of Yorkshire.

“These helicopters belong to the people of Yorkshire and will do so for the next 10 to 20 years. I am very proud to say we now have a level of service which is probably the best of any air ambulance charity in the UK.”

North Yorkshire welcomed its new air ambulance with a special reception at the Devonshire Arms Hotel, Bolton Abbey, attended by many of the regions local dignitaries, Mayors and long standing supporters of the Charity from the Northern part of the region.

The Yorkshire Air Ambulance are also currently working with The Devonshire Arms as they are the hotels adopted Charity of the Year.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance still needs to raise £12,000 every single day to keep its helicopters flying. The charity serves 5million people across Yorkshire, attending on average, more than 1,200 incidents a year.

Robert Wood was doing maintenance work on the 106-year-old bells at Middleham Parish Church, in Wensleydale, when he slipped and fell several feet onto part of the mechanism, impaling his chin on a metal peg.

The impact smashed Robert’s jaw and narrowly missed the major blood vessels in his neck. Amazingly, the 62-year-old managed to make his way down the tower to a shocked colleague who called the emergency services.

Fearing major blood vessel and nerve damage, Yorkshire Air Ambulance airlifted the retired environmental health officer to the major trauma centre at James Cook University Hospital, Middlesbrough.

His freak accident will feature in the January 30 episode of Helicopter ER, the UKTV series that follows the life-saving work of Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

Robert, a regular bell ringer at Ripon Cathedral, underwent a four-hour operation to repair his shattered jaw, which is now held together by metal plates, and spent five days in hospital.

“I was at the top of the tower, walking across the metal bell frame when I missed my footing and ended up landing chin-first onto a piece of the bell mechanism which had a rusty metal peg on the end,” said Robert from Ripon.

“I managed to get myself off that and make my way down the ladder. It’s amazing what you can do with adrenalin.

“The land and then air ambulance were there very quickly and I was just so grateful to be flown to hospital within minutes. They saved me from what would have been a long and painful journey of over an hour on winding roads.”

Robert is making a second attempt at a special bell ringing marathon on Saturday (January 14) at Ripon Cathedral, in a bid to raise the estimated £4,000 cost of his air ambulance flight.

Last year, 14 per cent of all patients carried by the Yorkshire Air Ambulance were taken to Sheffield’s Northern General Hospital, and following the opening of a state-of-the-art helipad six months ago, the Charity are expecting to see this figure increase during 2017.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance has also just invested in a brand, new £6m night-capable helicopter which should further increase the number of missions flown into the fully lit Sheffield helipad.

The rapid response emergency service has now appointed a new Community Fundraiser for South Yorkshire, Charlie Pearson, who is keen to increase YAA’s team of volunteers in the area.

“With the new helipad, the Yorkshire Air Ambulance’s distinctive yellow helicopter is becoming a more common sight across the skies of South Yorkshire,” said 27-year-old Charlie.

“That increased activity is set to grow further and we need to recruit more volunteers to support the life-saving work of this fantastic charity.

“Because we never door knock, cold call or door-to-door recycle we need more volunteers on the ground who can attend community events, man information stalls or give talks.

“Being a volunteer is a really great way to get out and about in your local area and meet people. You would be part of a fantastic team and you can do as little or as much as you want, to fit in with your lifestyle.”

Yorkshire Air Ambulance, which needs to raise £12,000 every day, serves 5million people across Yorkshire and carries out over 1,250 missions every year.

If you would like to find out more about becoming a South Yorkshire volunteer for Yorkshire Air Ambulance contact Charlie on 07768175727 or email c.pearson@yaa.org.uk

Caption: New Yorkshire Air Ambulance South Yorkshire Community Fundraiser Charlie Pearson

Carolyn Bjelan is now calling for all schools and workplaces to teach life-saving skills to improve the chances of people surviving a cardiac arrest outside hospital.

Carolyn had to use her life-saving skills when husband Jovan suddenly collapsed at their Harrogate home while doing some DIY.

“I was upstairs and heard a loud thud and when I found him I thought he must have fallen off the ladder,” said the 52-year-old head of Project Coordination and Customer Services at stone specialists Lapicida in Knareborough.

“When I realised he wasn’t breathing there were a few seconds when I panicked and thought I can’t do this, but then the training kicked in and I knew I had to act quickly.

“I started CPR and rang for the ambulance putting them on speaker phone. I knew time was so important as the longer the brain is starved of oxygen the greater the chance of brain injury.”

Carolyn continued performing CPR on her husband until the emergency services arrived, saving his life. Jovan’s heart started beating again but when he came round the 55-year-old was very agitated and Yorkshire Air Ambulance medics decided to place him in an induced coma before flying him to Leeds General Infirmary.

Over 30,000 people suffer cardiac arrests outside of hospital in the UK every year. If this happens in front of a bystander who starts CPR immediately before the arrival of the ambulance, the patient’s chances of survival double.

Today, if you suffer a cardiac arrest out of hospital in the UK, you have less than a one in ten chance of surviving.

It was hugely traumatic for Carolyn and her daughter Danielle, 34, but having had repeated CPR training meant she knew what to do and could act to save her husband’s life.

“I did suffer post-traumatic stress afterwards and I did get some help,” added Carolyn. “But we have amazing family and friends who were just fantastically supportive and Jovan is absolutely fine now.

“I’ve been a Brownie leader for years and having worked in construction too, I’ve always kept my first aid training up and had done CPR refresher training just a month before this happened. If I hadn’t Jovan might not be here.

“I do feel really strongly that CPR training should be much more widely taught in workplaces, in the community and in every school. We need to raise more awareness about the importance of having these skills.”

Doctors have never discovered what caused Jovan’s heart failure, but he has been fitted with an internal cardiac defibrillator which will shock his heart if it happens again.

The dramatic incident features in the UKTV series Helicopter ER which follows the life-saving work of Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

The series airs at 10pm every Monday night on UKTV’s reality channel Really. It has been made by many of the team behind the popular BBC programme Helicopter Heroes, who have again been flying with Yorkshire Air Ambulance pilots, paramedics and doctors.

The rapid response emergency charity serves 5million people across Yorkshire and carries out over 1,250 missions every year. YAA needs to raise £12,000 every day and is currently replacing its two ageing aircraft with brand new, state-of-the-art Airbus H145 helicopters.

Noah fell onto the concrete patio of the family home at Brampton Bierlow, near Rotherham, in an accident which features on tonight’s episode of Helicopter ER, the TV series that follows the life-saving work of Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

“My four-year-old daughter had been playing a game and opened the bedroom window,” said Mum Emma. “Noah must have somehow climbed from the bed onto the window ledge and fallen.

“My daughter came running out of the bedroom to say Noah had fallen out of the window and I just ran as fast as I could to the back garden.

“He was lying on the patio very still and making a quiet moaning noise. I was just hysterical. It’s just your worst nightmare.”

Yorkshire Air Ambulance airlifted Noah in minutes to Sheffield Children’s Hospital where scans revealed the 18-month-old had suffered a fractured skull and a small bleed on the brain.

Noah’s grateful family believe the speed of the rapid response emergency service saved their son’s life. To say thank you, they organized a 10-mile sponsored walk raising £3,000 for Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

“I think Noah survived because he got to hospital so quickly. It was literally six minutes in the helicopter from our house and we can’t thank them enough,” added 27-year-old Emma.

Noah, now two, has fully recovered and has no lasting damage from the accident which features on Helicopter ER tonight(19th Dec 2016) at 10pm on UKTV’s reality channel Really.

The new series has been made by many of the team behind the popular BBC programme Helicopter Heroes, who have again been flying with Yorkshire Air Ambulance pilots, paramedics and doctors.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance serves 5million people across Yorkshire and carries out over 1,250 missions every year from its two bases at RAF Toplcliffe, near Thirsk, and Nostell near Wakefield.

The charity, which has just replaced its two, ageing aircraft with state-of-the-art Airbus H145 helicopters, needs to raise £12,000 every day.

The rapid response emergency charity has been awarded the coveted Kitemark Award status by Voluntary Action Rotherham and the Rotherham Local Strategic Partnership.

The award aims to showcase good practice and recognizes the “high quality, positive volunteering experience” received by Yorkshire Air Ambulance’s team of volunteers.

Charlie Pearson, YAA South Yorkshire Community Fundraiser, said: “We are absolutely delighted to have received not just the Kitemark, but the Kitemark Plus status.

“We have a great team of volunteers in South Yorkshire who do a brilliant job for us. We pride ourselves on doing what we can, as a charity to support and recognize the key role our volunteers have.”

Yorkshire Air Ambulance needs to raise £12,000 every day and is currently replacing its two, ageing aircraft with brand new, state-of-the-art Airbus H145 helicopters.

The independent charity serves 5million people across Yorkshire and carries out over 1,250 missions every year. The number of patients being airlifted to Sheffield’s major trauma centre is on the rise following the opening of a state-of-the-art helipad at the Northern General Hospital in June.

And Yorkshire Air Ambulance is now appealing for more volunteers to raise funds and awareness about its life-saving work. The charity is looking for individuals, couples or small groups of friends to join their friendly team of volunteers in South Yorkshire.

Charlie added: “There are many ways people can get involved; helping to run YAA stalls at local events, collecting donations, or giving talks and any time you can give is very much appreciated.

“It’s also a lot of fun and people get so much from volunteering. It’s a great way to make friends and be part of the local community.”

If you would like to find out more about becoming a South Yorkshire volunteer for Yorkshire Air Ambulance contact Charlie on 07768175727 or email c.pearson@yaa.org.uk

Caption: Yorkshire Air Ambulance South Yorkshire Community Fundraiser Charlie Pearson with the Kitemark Plus status award from Voluntary Action Rotherham.

Employee, Claire Ormesher, carried out the brave skydive to supplement the store’s already strong fundraising efforts.  The team cycled 40 miles on an in-store static bike – the distance from Skipton to Lancaster and took part in the charity’s ‘Save Your Copper for a Chopper’ initiative by donating their loose change.

Claire, a Customer Assistant at the Skipton store, said: “I’m over the moon with the amount we’ve managed to raise as a team for a cause so close to our hearts. Yorkshire Air Ambulance does an amazing job but it costs a staggering £12,000 a day to keep two helicopters in the air, so the charity relies on support from the community. This is why we were so keen to support the service and to ensure they carry on their vital service across our region.

Linda Stead, Yorkshire Air Ambulance North Yorkshire Community Fundraiser said: “We are truly grateful for the support we have received from staff and customers at the M&S Foodhall in Skipton. We are an independent charity which really relies on organisations and individuals such as M&S to enable us to keep doing such important work across the region.

“The money raised by the M&S staff will go towards purchasing our two new state-of-the-art replacement Airbus H145 helicopters, which will be taking to the skies over Yorkshire later this year. The first one, G-YAAC, is already operational and the second, G-YOAA is expected to be operational before Christmas.”

UKAR is the holding company established six years ago to manage the closed mortgage books of Bradford & Bingley, Mortgage Express and NRAM.

Over the last 18 months, UKAR staff at their Crossflatts office, near Bingley, have raised more than £11,500 after choosing Yorkshire Air Ambulance as their local charity.

This brings the total raised by UKAR for the rapid response emergency service to more than £36,500.

Alongside donations from monthly dress down days, staff also held a variety of events including a site to site cycle ride from their Sunderland office to Crossflatts, bake sales, tombolas and raffles with UKAR match-funding individual and group fund raising activities.

Kerry Garner, Regional Fundraising Manager for Yorkshire Air Ambulance, said: “We are extremely grateful for the tremendous support of UKAR and all their amazing staff.

“They have been brilliant to work with and we cannot thank them enough for their generosity.”

Yorkshire Air Ambulance serves 5million people across Yorkshire and carries out over 1,250 missions every year. The independent charity needs to raise £12,000 every day and is currently replacing its two ageing aircraft with brand new, state-of-the-art Airbus H145 helicopters.

In September, the first of these went into service at the charity’s Air Support Base in Nostell, near Wakefield. It is hoped the second Airbus will be flying over the skies of Yorkshire before the end of the year.

UKAR is responsible for around 215,000 customers holding £33.1 billion of mortgages and loans. UKAR Corporate Services Ltd, a subsidiary of UKAR, also administers the Government’s Help to Buy Mortgage Guarantee and Help to Buy ISA Schemes.

In June this year UKAR outsourced its mortgage servicing, which saw approximately 1,700 staff move to Computershare Loan Services. UKAR now comprises of approximately 200 colleagues, mainly based in Crossflatts, West Yorkshire.

Caption: Kerry Garner, Regional Fundraising Manager for Yorkshire Air Ambulance (L) receives a cheque of more than £11,000 from Julie Marsden of Computershare Loan (C) and Nerys Hird of UKAR.

Nexus employees took part in a series of fund-raising challenges including a 160-mile round-trip bike ride from Harrogate to Scarborough and two gruelling expeditions into the Yorkshire Dales to complete the Three Peaks challenge.

Bake sales, raffles and other internal initiatives helped to make up the total.

The partnership with The Yorkshire Air Ambulance began in June 2015 with Nexus setting out its commitment to raise £12,000 for the charity, the amount needed to keep the service operational each day.

David Brennan, CEO at Nexus Vehicle Rental said: “We are incredibly proud of our team’s fund-raising efforts and although we have taken part in some very tough challenges we have also had a lot of fun along the way.

“As a Yorkshire-based business, it’s a pleasure to be able to support The Yorkshire Air Ambulance which provides such a crucial and life-saving service in our region, and is a charity close to the hearts of so many of our staff, customers and partners.”

Kerry Garner, Yorkshire Air Ambulance regional fund-raising manager for West and South Yorkshire added: “Since our partnership with Nexus began in 2015 the staff have been amazingly enthusiastic and have been fully committed to making sure our partnership has been a huge success.

“It has been a pleasure working with such a determined team – it is businesses and groups such as this that enable us to provide Yorkshire with rapid response emergency service, 365 days a year.

“We’d like to take this opportunity to thank the employees for their support and congratulate them on such a fantastic amount raised for the YAA”

Revealed at a special evening event at PPG Canalside on Tuesday evening, this season’s route has been inspired by the journey that Huddersfield Town Head Coach David Wagner and his assistant Christoph Buehler made just over a year ago.

Echoing David and Christoph’s route, cyclists will be asked to travel from Dortmund in Germany to Huddersfield Town to raise funds for the Keep It Up campaign, which generates funds for the Yorkshire Air Ambulance and the Huddersfield Town Academy.

The journey will begin on the afternoon of Tuesday 2 May 2017, when the cyclists will depart Town’s PPG Canalside training complex on coaches heading for Hull. At approximately 7pm, they will board a ferry to Rotterdam.

Upon arrival on the following day, the coach journey will continue to Dortmund; around 160 miles in total.

Arriving at noon, the cyclists will then begin the journey home from outside Borussia Dortmund’s impressive Westfalenstadion – cycling around 45 miles to the first overnight stop of Wesel.

The second leg, on Thursday 4 May, will see cyclists cross the border into the Netherlands, with the day ending at the city of Nijmegen around 42 miles later.

Friday 5 May is the longest leg for the cyclists, spanning 88 miles across the Netherlands to Rotterdam in time for the evening ferry back to Hull.

On the morning of Saturday 6 May, the final leg sees cyclists make the return journey from Hull to Huddersfield, ending at PPG Canalside in a pie and peas celebration; around 80 miles in total.

The now traditional lap of honour will still take place at the final game of the season a day later when Wagner’s side hosts Cardiff City at the John Smith’s Stadium in a noon kick-off. Cyclists will meet up at PPG Canalside at 11am and travel to the stadium together.

The Club is looking for 120 cyclists in total, each tasked with raising a minimum of £750 for the Keep It Up campaign.

Each cyclist must pay a £250 registration fee, which will cover the cost of the ferry crossings to and from mainland Europe and the hotels on each evening.

Visit www.htafc.com to download the sign-up form and medical form.

The sign-up and medical forms, along with the £250 registration fee, must be returned to Andy Booth, either via email on andy.booth@htafc.com or hard copies to Andy Booth at PPG Canalside (509 Leeds Road, Huddersfield, HD2 1YJ). You can also drop them in at the Ticket Office at the John Smith’s Stadium.

Places on the ride will be assigned on a first come, first served basis – so don’t delay!

Club Ambassador Andy Booth commented:

“The Pedal for Pounds announcements are now one of the most anticipated dates in the calendar; I know because I get the questions!

“We always work hard to make the rides different, as we could see from the success of the ‘Shankly Tour’ last season, and I think the Wagner Way certainly fits the bill this season.

“Several fans have suggested this as a possibility since the day David and Christoph joined us in November 2015 and I’m really happy that we’ve been able to sort the organization. We’ve tried to take care of every detail to make things as easy as possible for the riders this time around.

“We expect the ride to be very popular, but it is limited to 120 riders due to the ferry bookings. As such, I’d urge anyone who is interested to complete the sign-up process as quickly as possible to avoid disappointment!

“As always, thanks to all the volunteers and staff that are volunteering their time to make the ride possible – as well as everyone who came to the launch evening at PPG Canalside.”

This season’s ride is being held in association with Made by Cooper; a local company with respected worldwide reputation for quality and design.

Based in Lion Chambers in Huddersfield, St George’s Square, the company creates enamel lapel pin badges, patches, medals, toys and much more, with a team of professional designers to help realise your ideas.

Made by Cooper ships worldwide, with about 40% of customers in the USA. It works with all types of clients, from individuals that want keepsakes for their wedding day, to international companies such as BBC, ITV, HSBC, Tate Modern, Warner Bros, and many more including the Town Foundation.

The Club’s previous Pedal for Pounds bike rides have contributed over £1 million to the total raised for the campaign since its inception in 2009.

If you want to donate some money to the ride, please visit www.justgiving.com/keepitupcampaign or text KIUP99 £5 (or any other amount) to 70070!

If you are tweeting about the ride, please use the hashtag #P4P8 and the Club’s official Twitter account, www.twitter.com/htafcdotcom, will retweet some of the best!