Essex firefighters take on Ben Nevis for charity

A group of Essex firefighters will be ascending UK’s tallest mountain to raise thousands of pounds for charity.

On 18 May, a team of 11 Halstead firefighters will be ascending Ben Nevis wearing heavy and restrictive fire gear.

They have also decided to take a fire service ladder and pitch it at the very top, which will be the UK's highest ladder pitch ever achieved.

The challenging trek is to raise funds for the Fire Fighters Charity – an organisation that provides mental, physical and social support to both active and retired firefighters.

Tom Easter has been a Halstead firefighter for 7 years and is the organiser of the event.

He said: "The Fire Fighters charity is a really, really important charity for us down here. They help firefighters like myself who have potentially had an injury, get back into work. They also help with mental health issues because obviously a lot of stuff that we see isn't great and we kind of have to deal with that in our own way. Some people just need that little bit of extra help just to get over those things.

“So, the Fire Fighters charity is basically there as support for us guys, operational and non-operational as well. When I'm retired, one day if I ever needed the charity, they'll still help me based on my service. So they're a fantastic charity and we're really pleased to be raising some money for them.

They have almost reached half of their target amount of £5,000.

You can donate at: Thomas Easter is fundraising for The Fire Fighters Charity (justgiving.com)