South Cambridgeshire District Council has approved the charity’s application for a new purpose-built air ambulance facility at New Shardelowes Farm on Balsham Road, Fulbourn – a first step in East Anglian Air Ambulance’s mission to secure a new home in Cambridgeshire.
The charity, which operates from two strategically located bases in Cambridge and Norwich, ensuring its two helicopters can cover anywhere in the region within 25 minutes, has had to search for an alternative site to operate its Cambridge-based service due to the impending closure of Cambridge Airport.
To find a site that offered similar response times to its current home, East Anglian Air Ambulance carried out extensive research and assessed dozens of potential sites, including airfields, across Cambridgeshire. The Fulbourn site ranked highest against specialist aviation, clinical, and rapid-response criteria, which are vital for reaching patients in life-threatening emergencies as quickly and safely as possible.
The charity now urgently needs to raise the money to build the new base. The approved site is located 2km southeast of Fulbourn village and extends to approximately 10.35 acres. In addition to helipads and a hangar, plans include a garage area for the charity’s critical care cars, crew facilities, a medical store, a training and educational area, and overnight accommodation and resting facilities for night shift and visiting crew, as well as office space for ground staff.
Richard Hindson, East Anglian Air Ambulance Director of Operations and Infrastructure, said: “East Anglian Air Ambulance and the owners of Cambridge City Airport, Marshall, have worked together since 2007 to ensure that the charity’s Cambridge crew can swiftly attend local people in their moment of greatest need. But that chapter is coming to an end with the planned closure of the airport. We have acted quickly to identify a new site for our Cambridge-based operation that will allow us to continue providing this vital service, which directly treated over 900 people in 2025.
"We are delighted to have been granted planning permission for our new base in Fulbourn, and grateful to all those who supported our application. However, this is just the start of our journey to a new home. Creating a new Cambridgeshire air base, from scratch, is our biggest ever project and we need to raise a significant sum of money to make this happen.
"Our bases aren’t ordinary buildings. They are vital lifelines for countless families, friends, and colleagues – anyone whose life would be devastated by the sudden tragic loss of a parent, a child, a spouse, a caregiver, or a friend. The new base will safeguard the continuity of our lifesaving air ambulance service and deliver vital improvements in crew welfare, training facilities and public engagement. This is a hugely exciting opportunity for the future of critical care in our region, and we will be launching an appeal in the coming weeks to help us raise the money needed to build our new home and ensure we can meet the region’s future critical care needs for generations to come.”
Read more: Cambridge Air Base plans - East Anglian Air Ambulance
