BLOG: Going to greater heights for Friends of the Cancer Centre
"I wanted to give something back to this charity as a token of my appreciation for all their support and kindness."
A blog by Professor Peter Robertson, Associate Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion).
This year is the 40th anniversary of Friends of the Cancer Centre, which is a local charity supporting cancer patients and their families in Northern Ireland. Friends of the Cancer Centre fund a broad range of initiatives, including: providing free tea and coffee to patients attending clinics at the Bridgewater Suite in Belfast City Hospital and the North West Cancer Centre in Altnagelvin Hospital; funding Clinical Nurse Specialists; and supporting cancer research in Northern Ireland. They also engage in fantastic work around raising cancer awareness throughout the country. Importantly, too, Friends of the Cancer Centre have set up day rooms in the Cancer Centre and ward 6 in the City Hospital, where patients can spend time away from their beds with their families.
Since my own diagnosis with myelodysplastic in 2018, a rare blood cancer, myself and my family have had direct support from Friends while I have been both an outpatient and an inpatient at Belfast City Hospital. I, therefore, wanted to give something back to this charity as a token of my appreciation for all their support and kindness. I had previously undertaken the 'Take on the Tower' abseil down Belfast City Hospital in 2022 and 2023, but I felt it was time for a new challenge and that I needed to go to greater heights, so I signed up for a 15,000 ft Tandem Skydive with Skydive Ireland who are based in Garvagh.
I successfully completed the Skydive on Saturday 17 May. The day itself was fantastic – in terms of weather conditions, we had cloudless blue skies and warm sunshine, which doesn’t happen that often in the North West. My wife, Jeanette, and my son Keir came up to watch my jump. My brother Paul and his wife, who live in the North West and one of Paul’s friends also joined us on the day, so I had a brilliant team supporting me.
The Team at Skydive Ireland were awesome and took me through the various training and guidance around what to expect, with calm professionalism. In particular, a big shout out for my instructor and tandem 'Skydive Buddy', Simon, who was absolutely brilliant and kept me calm and focused and made the whole thing really fun and enjoyable. The flight up to the jump height was awesome, as there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and Simon provided a commentary on the various sights we could see out the window.
Once at 15,000 ft, the door was opened and the various skydivers started to disembark. Simon and myself were last out, and when I was sitting on the edge of the plane at the door waiting to go, I was overawed by the views. Next thing I knew, we were free-falling, and it was one of the most exhilarating experiences I’ve ever had; the speed and noise of the wind were phenomenal; I was informed that you can reach speeds of up to 120 mph in the free-fall descent.
After about a minute, the parachute was deployed, and everything became really quiet. At that point, Simon let me take control of the parachute. I was able to see from the west coast of Ireland right across to Scotland, although I couldn’t quite see our old home in Aberdeen. Simon then took control again, and we had a perfect landing, all down to Simon’s experience and professionalism.
The most rewarding part of the whole experience, however, was the immense generosity of my supporters through my JustGiving page, and I raised over £4,400 for Friends of the Cancer Centre. The Chief Executive of Friends of the Cancer Centre put this into context in a comment on a post I made on LinkedIn about the jump. This funding was enough to cover more than 167 hours of a clinical Nurse Specialist, or 17,498 cups of tea or coffee. The Clinical Nurse Specialist is a particularly important person in a Cancer patient's life. They really get to know you as an individual, genuinely understand what you go through and are often your first point of contact outside clinics, so it was very special for me to know that the funding can continue to support these great individuals. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Christine, Ciara and Ana from Friends of the Cancer Centre for their support with the arrangements for the skydive and the associated fundraising.
I’m still on quite a high following the jump, and if anyone is thinking of doing a skydive for charity, I would thoroughly recommend it. To be honest, it was actually less scary than the abseiling was!
Donations are still warmly welcomed in support of my fundraiser and can be made here. All contributions will help fund the vital work the charity does to support local people living with cancer.
To find out more about the important work of Friends of the Cancer Centre, please click here: www.friendsofthecancercentre.com.
