Great North Air Ambulance
The Great North Air Ambulance Service (GNAAS) is a registered charity based in the United Kingdom. It operates a dedicated helicopter emergency service for the North of England with three aircraft, serving North Yorkshire, the North-East, Cumbria and Scottish borders. Operations. GNAAS operates three helicopters from its two bases at Langwathby near Penrith in Cumbria, Eaglescliffe in County Durham, and a forward operating base at Newcastle International Airport. All three aircraft were introduced into service during 2010 and 2011 are owned by the charity, previous aircraft being leased. All three helicopters are Eurocopter AS365 Dauphin  N2 models registered as: G-NHAA, G-NHAB and G-NHAC, and were built in 1991, 1991 and 1996 respectively. The latter acts as a back-up helicopter, working from either of the two bases as and when required. G-NHAA is named "Guardian of the North". G-NHAB is named "Pride of Cumbria". To mitigate the risk of flying older aircraft, in 2019 the charity bought a AS365 Dauphin N3, registration G-NHAD, named "Guardian of the North II", which was built in 2015. It is now operational at the Eaglescliffe base. In hours of darkness, when the helicopters  do not fly, North East Ambulance Service funds a Medical Emergency Response Incident Team (MERIT), which is staffed by a doctor and paramedic team from GNAAS. The MERIT service extended in November 2018 to cover Thursday to Sunday Nights, which were previously covered on an on-call basis. The service uses Volvo XC90 vehicles. In 20142015, GNAAS had operating costs of £4.6million and an income of £6.2million. In 20202021, the operating costs were £5.2million against an income of £8.5million, which included a total of £308,000 from government contracts and grants. In the media. From 8  March 2018, the charity appeared on Channel 4's TV programme "Emergency Helicopter Medics", which followed the crews responding and treating emergency patients. Other air ambulances that featured in the show include Thames Valley Air Ambulance and East Anglian Air Ambulance.