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Intrepid news team dress up as animals

Fancy-dress newspaper fundraisers dressed up as animals and abseiled down a seven storey building to raise £650 for charity.

Six members of the team at Mid Somerset News and Media were part of a group of 90 volunteers who brought in between £8,000 and £10,000 for good causes by taking part in a charity abseil at the local council offices.

Four reporters, an editorial assistant and a member of the business support team abseiled down the high C-Block, County Hall, Taunton.

The Mid Somerset News and Media team dressed as a dinosaur, zebra, giraffe, bunny rabbit, shark and a leopard.

Editor of the Mid Somerset Series Bede MacGowan said: “I was  bag of nerves as I sat in a warm boardroom eating biscuits and waiting for news. But my hopes of a dramatic and sudden reduction in wage costs were dashed when the text came through – all had survived.

“Despite that, I must admit to being extremely proud of them all for their courage in taking on this challenge for what was and remains a very good cause.”

Wells Journal reporter, Ruth Ovens, who was dressed as a dinosaur, said:  “Abseiling down the seven storey building was fun, even though walking over the ledge at the top was a bit scary.”

The funds raised will be divided equally between Somerset Community Foundation, an organisation that helps flood victims, and Somerset County Council’s Chairman’s Charities – the National Autistic Society and Somerset Trust for Arts and Recreation (a charity which provides ‘ little extras’ for disadvantaged Somerset children).

The office also raised £650 by auctioning off the sign from the Somerfield store featured in the movie Hot Fuzz, which was filmed in Wells, where the newspaper office is based.

The sign had been autographed end by Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and director Edgar Wright.