Volunteer stories
Here from our volunteers on why they support our charity
Hilary's story
Wiltshire Air Ambulance volunteer Hilary Fleming began fundraising for the charity in an obscure way in 2021.
The idea came about after “lockdown madness”, with the country still enveloped in the Coronavirus pandemic.
Hilary decided she would embark on her daily walk wearing a different hat, asking for donations to Wiltshire Air Ambulance along the way.
Hilary’s husband Shaun has been saved twice by Wiltshire Air Ambulance after falls from height.
The first saw his come off a ladder while decorating and he suffered multiple fractures in his neck, back and arm. He was flown by Wiltshire Air Ambulance to Frenchay Hospital in Bristol and underwent an eight-hour operation at the Royal United Hospital in Bath.
Hilary’s husband Shaun has been saved twice by Wiltshire Air Ambulance after falls from height.
The first saw his come off a ladder while decorating and he suffered multiple fractures in his neck, back and arm. He was flown by Wiltshire Air Ambulance to Frenchay Hospital in Bristol and underwent an eight-hour operation at the Royal United Hospital in Bath.
A year later Shaun fell from a shed roof and fractured his shoulders, hip and skill. Once again Wiltshire Air Ambulance were on hand to assist and he has since made a full recovering – going on to run two marathons, raising money for the charity along the way.
Hilary completed a remarkable year-long “Hatwalk 21” challenge by donning a different hat for 365 days straight.
That was where it was meant to stop, but she continued the run into a Hat-exercise 22, where she undertook 30 minutes of exercise each day, again showcasing a different style hat.
She took part in cycles, swims, yoga, bodyboarding and more – and is still continuing.
"I am up to hat number 940 and I’ve got no plans to stop, just as Wiltshire Air Ambulance doesn’t stop saving lives, so why should I stop fundraising.”
Hilary Fleming
Q&As
Ian Best has kindly written a Q&A for anyone looking to find out more about becoming a volunteer.
I decided to retire in March 2013 and having really enjoyed my work I found that retirement left a big hole, so volunteering was an obvious way to do something useful and keep active.
A friend suggested I look at the do-it.org website and there I found that WAA were looking for volunteers. It seemed a worthwhile charity and having started my professional life as an avionics engineer I think there may have been a subconscious draw to an aviation linked good cause. The rest as they say is just history.
My wife, Lorna, joined me a little later so we now work very much as a team.
I do whatever needs doing really, which includes:
- attending events such as fetes, shows and sports events
- bucket collections
- cheque presentations
- collecting tin distribution
I have also been known to get my shovel out to help move several tonnes of gravel at the airbase and I try to make it along to help with the annual Christmas card gathering where we sort and distribute cards across the county.
Lorna, being a retired teacher, is ideally suited to help with the Emergency Awareness Training programme, which teaches both primary and secondary aged children basic lifesaving skills.
Somewhat ironically, considering that I did a lot of public speaking in my professional life, the one thing I don't tend to get involved in is giving talks to clubs and organisations but the charity has a great team that does that so I feel I can best use my time elsewhere.
To start with I wouldn't call it work, that word has connotations of commitments and working hours which I don't feel really applies in my volunteering role. One of the great things about volunteering is that WAA has no expectations of how many events we volunteers do or how often.
Having said that, before the Coronavirus pandemic hit, Lorna and I probably did something most weeks in the summer, but of course it gets much quieter on the event scene during the winter. There are some nice Christmas events that we go along to though.
I think it is great that everyone is treated the same, irrespective of how often they can turn out.
There are so many and we do have a lot of fun being with other volunteers but there are a few which stand out in my mind.
One of the early events that we went to was a music festival near Chippenham. This may seem a bit strange but Lorna and I had never been to a music festival before … well they didn't exist when we were young! The office asked if we would pop along to show our faces as WAA was one of the beneficiaries of the festival. So, we went along in our campervan thinking that we would probably just stay until Saturday evening…we came home Sunday night! At the event a young lady came up to me with tears in her eyes and said: “Thank you, if it wasn't for you guys my brother would have died.”That didn’t just underline for me what an important job WAA does in saving lives but it also helped me to realise that it isn’t just the patient that are saved but also the families and friends whose lives are affected as well.
When I started with the charity it was quite small based in one room in an office complex in Calne while the operations was based at Police HQ in Devizes, sharing the police helicopter. There have been some major steps forward since then and we were honoured to be invited along when WAA took ownership of our shiny new Bell helicopter, that was a great day. Later we had the pleasure to watch as the new HQ grew from a piece of farmland at Semington into the fabulous facility it is now.
One of the things I am continually amazed and humbled by is the incredible support of the people of Wiltshire and Bath, their generosity and support makes the role of the volunteer a real pleasure.
It's a question that I do ask myself occasionally, usually when I am stood in a field in the pouring rain and I could be at home in the dry! I'm sorry if this sounds a bit trite, but the reason I do it is in those words spoken by that young lady in the early days of my volunteering; " … if it wasn't for you guys my brother would have died". I don't have the amazing lifesaving skills of the medical team but I can help to raise awareness and money to keep them flying and what's a bit of rain anyhow!
I think the other motivation for me can be summed up in one word 'Success'. In my working life I found that there is no greater motivator than success, everyone likes to be associated with success, don't they? WAA is hugely successful and one of, if not the best, air ambulances in the UK, and I make no apology for being biased. We were one of the first air ambulance services to fly at night, one of the first to carry blood, one of the first to go out into the schools to teach lifesaving skills. There are so many firsts you can't help to feel proud to be associated with WAA, as it continues to push out the boundaries in all aspects of its work to better serve the people of our county and the surrounding areas.
Don't just think about it, get on and do it! What else could you do that will give you so much fun, take you places you may not go to otherwise and do your bit to keep the critical service flying, all at the same time? I am sure that my volunteering colleagues would agree that it is a huge privilege to be able to be part WAA. The feeling that you get when you see that helicopter fly over knowing that someone's day is going to be a lot better than it might have been really is something special.
Come on board it is a journey worth being part of.
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