GHA staff climb height of Everest twice to boost charity
Twenty-nine GHA staff completed 238 trips up the stairs of 23-storey blocks.
GHA staff raised a mountain of cash for charity by climbing the height of Mount Everest twice.
A team of 29 GHA environmental staff completed 238 trips up the stairs of the 23-storey blocks at 50, 60 and 70 Kennishead Avenue in Glasgow earlier this month.
That is the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest – which reaches 8,848 metres – not once, but twice.
Each staff member walked up and down the stairs alone in 20-minute time slots across all three blocks so they could maintain social distancing.
A few tired legs, but thankfully no frostbite helped the staff raise more than £1,500 for Getting The Message Across (GTMA), a youth-led charity in the south of Glasgow which helps young people through grassroots football.
GHA environmental team leader Elliott Gibb came up with the idea.
He said: “GTMA does great work supporting young people in GHA communities and we really wanted to help.
“The height of Everest is equivalent to 118 trips up the stairs of a 23-storey block – and we thought it would be a fun way of raising money for a great cause.
“We actually completed 238 trips. Twice the height of Everest and raised £1,515.
“Not sure what the view from the top of Everest is like but it would be hard to beat the view from the top of the Kennishead flats!”
Elliott and a colleague handed over a cheque to GTMA this week.
The environmental teams at GHA, part of Wheatley Group, have worked through lockdown keeping multi-storey sites clean and safe and helping deliver emergency food parcels to tenants in need.
Ethan Mcinally, Founder of GTMA, said: “We’d like to thank Elliott and his team for their support. It will really help us continue our work across our communities to help young people through peer education.”
Pictured: GHA’s Elliott Gibb, far right, and Colin Clark, far left, with Kelsi McFadden and Ethan Mcinally of charity, Getting The Message Across at Govan Cross.