Air ambulances are run by a county by county basis. Here in the peak District we can call upon East Midlands air Ambulance who have two choppers based at East Midlands airport. My bit of the Peak can also be served by south yorkshire, greater manchester or for one small bit (lyme park) merseyside air ambulances
Mountain Rescue (vested interest here as I am a member of Kinder Mountain Rescue Team, based in Hayfield) - is a bottom up organisation (unlike RNLI which is top down). Individual teams fund raise for themselves, my own team needs approx £12 k to remain operational. We receive no government funding, we are all volunteers and rely upon our employers to conveniently and generously allow us out of work to attend jobs. Local teams are then members of regional organisations. Kinder team is part of the Peak District Mountain Rescue Organisation, sort of a regional admin, training and policy think tank. PDMRO's biggest role is to provide call out officers (duty controllers) - these controllers are the direct link between the police and the team. When you dial 999 you will get through to the police, police contact the duty controller. The duty controller then decides which team(s) are needed for the job in hand.
Individual teams and regional organisations are then members of the national councils. England and Wales has its own 'national' organisation MR(E&W), as do Scotland, and Ireland. The three councils join up for conferences.
Individual teams make up their own methods and strategies, policies, ways of working; regional organisations help run medical and training at a strategic level locally. National Councils sort out stuff like indemnity insurance, drugs licensing, they administer medical stuff etc
If you decide to plump for MR as an adopted charity then you need to decide who to help. Say you raise a grand over a year- an individual team, like mine, could do a lot with a grand - fuel for two land rovers for six months say.
Kinder team for example are hoping to start fundraising for a new base soon - we have an 'offer' in the pipeline which could really do us good. We need garaging for our ambulances (£65k's worth of land rovers are currently parked in a field); a toilet would be good; gear storage necessary....
ALL teams could repeat such stories of need. Please click on my website button to find out more about Mountain Rescue. You will go to the Kinder website, links to other teams, PDMRO, MR(E&W) etc.
The diary of a team member section will give you an insight into what individual team members commit to, when they join up. And yes we are on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year!
