Hilton London Stansted Airport goes the distance for charity

TEAM members at Hilton London Stansted Airport managed to cross continents without leaving the airport at a charity event held on Sunday.

They joined supporters of the Panathlon Challenge and two metropolitan police teams at the departures section of the airport as part of a continental-wide charity effort to help to collectively travel a total of 40,07km, the exact circumference of the earth.

Intrigued holiday makers and passers-by chipped in to cover some distance on rowing machines, bikes and treadmills, and donated to the challenge to raise funds for Panathlon.

The team also enjoyed the support of the GB Canoe and sprint slalom teams and the GB deaf football team, all of whom were on their way to tournaments in Europe but still found time to clock up a few kilometres on the gym equipment.

In fact the challenge turned into an airport wide affair in support of Panathlon, a charity which organises sports tournaments for young people with disabilities.

Staff from the ISS security team, cleaners, traffic wardens, armed police and Easyjet staff all wore pedometers to track the kilometres covered, while fundraising buckets were placed at Caf� Italia, the Money Exchange, the Pub, National Express and Corals Bookmakers.

In total 1,296km were covered towards the total.

Thanks to the efforts at Stansted and other Hilton hotels around the country enough distance was covered to make it around the globe with a grand total of 52,343km – comfortably making it around the world!

Liz Major, the Stansted hotel’s Hilton Foundation champion, was thrilled with the day’s fundraising.

She said: “I was so impressed to see so many people taking the time and effort to help out and we had a lot of fun along the way.

“The whole airport, from passengers and retailers to police and airline staff all chipped in to help us. Thank you so much to all the participants and to everyone who supported us.”

Hilton in the Community Foundation hopes to have raised a total of more than �150,000 for children’s charities, with over 2,500 participants signed up for sponsored kilometres. Nearly 100 hotels in eight countries took part, all selecting different charities to support with their fundraising. Fetes, barbeques and games were also held to fundraise and entertain as part of the foundation’s biggest ever charity initiative.