Big-hearted staff from the Leeds office of business advisory firm Deloitte have raised a staggering £10,000 for Yorkshire Air Ambulance.

Last June, the rapid response emergency service was selected as Deloitte in Yorkshire’s charity partner for the next two years after a vote by the 480 staff in the firm’s City Square offices.

Since then, staff have been raising much-needed funds through a range of activities from the traditional dress down days and bake sales, to the more adventurous including a sponsored 14-mile canoe challenge.

Helen Kaye, partner and corporate responsibility lead at Deloitte in Yorkshire, said: “I am delighted to have supported Yorkshire Air Ambulance as our local office charity for the last year.

“From the 480 people based in our Leeds office we have seen some fantastic fundraising efforts to help Yorkshire Air Ambulance in their mission to save lives across the county.

“Through our corporate responsibility programme at Deloitte our aim is to play a proactive role in helping our local charity deal with key organisational challenges, not just raising funds, but also by providing time and expertise through volunteering and pro-bono support.”

Yorkshire Air Ambulance serves five million people across the county and attends more than 1,000 incidents a year. The charity has so far airlifted more than 6,800 people to major trauma centres across the county.

Kerry Garner, Regional Fundraising Manager, said: “It has been a pleasure working with the Leeds Deloitte team over the last year and we would like to sincerely thank their staff for their amazing fundraising efforts!

“£10,000 is a huge amount of money for the Charity and will certainly help to keep saving lives across Yorkshire.  We are an independent Charity and rely on support from people such as the staff at Deloitte to help us raise the vital funds we need every day to keep both of our helicopters in the air and helping to save lives.”

The rapid response emergency service has recently placed an order for two, brand new state-of-the-art replacements for its current ageing aircraft – G-SASH and G-CEMS – that will take to the skies over Yorkshire later this year.

The latest generation Airbus H145 helicopters will give paramedics a much more modern medical fit-out to treat and transport often critically injured patients.