Hospital Friends clay pigeon shoot to raise money for Club Drug Clinic

The Friends of Chelsea & Westminster Hospital’s sixth charity clay pigeon shoot will be held on Friday 5 October at the Royal Berkshire Shooting School in Pangbourne, Berkshire.

This year all proceeds from the shoot will go to the Club Drug Clinic which is based in the Drug Treatment Centre at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital – this new service, which is run by Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust, specialises in helping to rehabilitate users of a new group of so-called ‘club drugs’ including ecstasy, ketamine and mephedrone.  

All money raised by the clay pigeon shoot will specifically fund a much-needed post of a member of staff to provide advice, support and assistance to parents and families of those addicted to these drugs.

Previous charity shoots have raised between £25,000 and £40,000 and the last shoot in 2010 enabled the Friends to provide the A&E Department at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital with nearly £40,000 worth of equipment and to create a special room, with a warming system, where burns patients are treated before they are transferred to the dedicated Burns Unit in the hospital.

This year’s event includes the opportunity to shoot at The Royal Arrows, radio-controlled, delta winged planes which fly among the clays during the flush. This novel addition to the day is kindly sponsored by the Chelsea branch of estate agents Knight Frank.

The day will start with breakfast, followed by four hours of shooting, a champagne reception, a three-course lunch and an auction of some interesting and unusual lots which will be under the hammer of a guest auctioneer.

The cost for each gun is £250 (£1,000 for a team of four) which includes the hospitality outlined above, mid-morning snacks and drinks, instructors, cartridges, clays, shotguns if required, hearing protection, and insurance.

The Friends of Chelsea & Westminster Hospital is a charity whose sole aim is to provide support to patients and staff of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and those in the wider community.