DEVON Air Ambulance has launched a new campaign to highlight the growing financial challenges facing the charity, with its Operations Director warning that public support is vital to securing the future of the service.

The charity’s ‘Keep Us Flying’ campaign aims to raise awareness of the costs involved in operating an air ambulance service and the fact that it receives no government or public funding.

Operations Director Tania Martin said the campaign was the most urgent in the charity’s history, as rising operating costs and increasingly unpredictable income put pressure on its finances.

She said there was a common assumption that a service so closely associated with emergency response must receive public funding.

However, Devon Air Ambulance relies entirely on donations.

‘Most people understand how vital the service is, but I have become increasingly conscious that many don’t realise how we are funding’, Tania said.

‘If you or someone you love is seriously ill or injured, you don’t want to be wondering about how the service is paid for; you just want to know that help is there’, she added.

She said the scale of work required to keep the service operational was not always understood, with a typical mission involving far more than the helicopter responding to an emergency.

Behind every call-out is a wider team responsible for ensuring crew have the training, equipment, vehicles and technology needed to deliver critical care.

In 2025, Devon Air Ambulance responded to more than 2,000 missions, which included close to 400 night-time missions, highlighting the demand placed in the service.

But meeting that demand is becoming increasingly expensive.

The charity faced a budget gap of £1.1 million in 2025, with rising costs and uncertainty around some income streams creating additional financial pressure.

Tania stressed that the campaign was not an emergency appeal and that the charity was not about to stop operating.

Instead, Keep Us Flying is intended to encourage a better understanding of the charity’s financial realities and its need to plan ahead.

Tania, whose role involves overseeing operations, said the situation was similar to maintaining an aircraft, where potential problems needed to be anticipated, rather than left until something went wrong.

‘You don’t wait for an aircraft to develop a problem before you start thinking about maintenance. You plan, check, prepare and try to deal with things early’, Tania said.

The charity has already taken steps to improve efficiency, with changes expected to save around £400,000 annually. Further work to manage costs will continue, but Tania said public awareness and continued support were equally important.

Devon Air Ambulance has provided critical care to people across the county for 34 years, and the campaign is about ensuring that work can continue for decades to come.

Tania said: ‘If we want this service to be here for the next patient, and for patients many years from now, we need to take action’.

She added that the campaign was about much more than keeping helicopters in the air.

‘It’ about keeping the whole service behind them ready for the next call, the next patient and the future’, she added.