A man who lost his brother in a motorcycle crash has donated more than £3,000 from his new business to the Great North Air Ambulance Service (GNAAS) in his memory.
Matthew Heath, 18, from Marske was driving along the B1269 road, near Dunsdale, in 2008 when his motorbike was involved in a collision with a car.
The critical care team from GNAAS flew to the scene of the incident, but despite their best efforts, Matthew died from his injuries.
Ever since, his brother Tom Heath, 38, of Redcar, has honoured Matthew’s memory by organising several fundraising events to support GNAAS including football tournaments, music events, horse race nights, family fun days, raffles and Boxing Day Dips.
Tom and his friends and family have raised more than £60,000 for GNAAS, and he was previously nominated for a Pride of Britain Award and made it to the final four in the North East of England.
Tom has now pledged to continue supporting GNAAS through his new business Opulent Odds, which is a North East based competition company that he co-owns with Kiefer Bradbury.
The competitions website offers the chance to win prizes such as luxury watches, holidays and even thousands of pounds in cash, and will be donating a portion of their profits to GNAAS.
This month Tom and Kiefer visited GNAAS’ base in Eaglescliffe to present a cheque for £3,060 from Opulent Odds, which included £1,500 from a charity cash competition giveaway ran by Ben Blackburn, owner of AAA Roofing, who was also present.
The money was won by Paul Vickers, owner at PV Window Cleaning, and he chose to donate it to Opulent Odds in support of their fundraising campaign for GNAAS.
Tom said: “Through Opulent Odds, we want to keep Matty’s memory alive while supporting a charity that works tirelessly to save lives across our region. GNAAS do truly life-saving work, and with your support, we hope to raise even more to help prevent other families from going through the pain of losing a loved one.”
This is the latest donation from the business after they previously gave £350 to the charity in July.
Ben Sisson, CSR and Philanthropy Specialist at GNAAS, said: “Tom has been an incredible supporter of ours for many years and we’re grateful to see his and Kiefer’s new company Opulent Odds continuing that support and keeping Matty’s memory alive.
“Our charity relies on public donations to remain operational, and it currently costs £9.3m a year to ensure our critical care team are able to respond to those in need across the region.
“Everyone who gets involved in Opulent Odds, whether that’s entering a draw or sharing and liking one of their social media posts, should be proud knowing that their actions are helping to support GNAAS.”
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