SunSkips helps Suffolk Accident Rescue Service raise £4.2k

Suffolk Accident Rescue Service (SARS) enjoyed another successful year raising funds by recycling local Christmas trees, bringing in a whopping £4,200.

The tree-mendous final tally – which beat the previous year’s total of £3,500 – speaks to the incredible effort made by volunteers running around the Suffolk area collecting more than 600 trees.

SunSkips donated a 40-yard ro-ro skip to store the old trees before they were taken to the Suffolk waste management firm’s site for processing.

This included weekend hours for the hardworking team and other local volunteers.

With SunSkips’ help, those who paid for the service can rest assured that their trees were properly processed in the most sustainable way possible.

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This year, SARS extended its collections to cover Sudbury and Haverhill, as well as other West Suffolk towns and villages.

Other local volunteers included TMO Highways, who went out collecting trees, and JPM Tree services, who chipped the green waste ready for recycling.

Money raised from the campaign goes towards emergency vehicles and equipment like monitors, which can run up to £12,500 each.

SARS is an entirely volunteer-run charity and receives no funding from local or central government.

Since 1972, volunteer SARS doctors and paramedics have answered calls for their assistance at serious or life-threatening incidents.

SARS volunteers were mobilised 525 times between April 2022 and March 2023. In 30% of the incidents attended, SARS was the first on the scene.

Advanced interventions from SARS have helped save countless lives and reduced the chance of permanent disability.

Volunteer medical professionals give their free time from already very demanding jobs to provide emergency care in Suffolk when ambulances might not reach them in time.

On top of providing urgent care, SARS also offers CPR workshops to businesses and community groups to increase the number of local people who know what to do in an emergency.

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One participant, Bernie Cleland, performed CPR on her husband Dave after a sudden cardiac arrest – a skill she had worked on at a SARS refresher workshop the day before.

The lifesaving technique kept Dave alive until SARS critical care paramedic Liam got there and took over.

Bernie said, “Liam was one of the first on scene attending in the role of a volunteer critical care paramedic.

“Not only did he give my husband the clinical care that he needed, he also went out of his way to explain to me in simple terms what was happening as my husband was being prepared for the EAAA helicopter.

“We were completely stunned when we later found out that Liam was doing all this as a volunteer in his own time. There are no words to express how thankful both my husband and myself are.”

After his experience, BT technician Dave now regularly volunteers for SARS, giving presentations and encouraging others to get involved.

Want to lend a hand to this worthwhile Suffolk charity? Get involved by contacting the team on 50for50@sars999.org.uk or head to sars999.org.uk to make a donation online.