Public backing needed for Yeovilton F-35-Queen Elizabeth play area

Launching an F-35 from the ski ramp of HMS Queen Elizabeth? It's child play.

Well, it will be at the Fleet Air Arm Museum in Yeovilton if £50,000 can be found to complete its playground facilities for young visitors - adding the ramp and a replica Lightning II stealth fighter 'taking off' from it.

The FAA revamped the play area in front of the museum last summer - but that was only the first step (and climb, jump and slide…) of the overhaul plans.

The pièce de résistance will be the mock-up of the ramp and jet which young and old will be able to clamber over (unlike the real thing).

The installation will cost £50,000 with the first £3,800 already raised courtesy of the Co-op Community Fund, but another £4,000 of public money is needed to get the project off the ground; other fundraising activities are planned to make up the shortfall.

Donors over £50 will receive a rare HMS Queen Elizabeth magazine; over £75 a HMS Queen Elizabeth pin badge; and those over £150 a Novelty Cushion, depicting the carrier's arrival in Portsmouth.

Anyone who donates over £250 will be invited to the special VIP launch of the new facility later in 2018.

Both the existing play area and the new ramp are open to the public and free to use whether visiting the museum itself or not.

To support the play area, visit www.justgiving.com/fundraising/the-national-museum-of-the-royal-navy