TRAIN company CrossCountry has donated money to Devon-based children's charity CHICKS.

CHICKS (Country Holidays for Inner City Kids), which provides life-enhancing respite beaks in the countryside for disadvantaged children and their carers, is the chosen charity of the company.

A total of £2,500 has been raised by CrossCountry in two ways. Firstly, money has been gathered through weekly 'Dress Down Friday' collection from CrossCountry's Birmingham head office. Secondly, a daredevil skydive was undertaken by CrossCountry manager, Kerry Cross, who jumped from a plane at 10,000 ft over the Northumberland coastline.

CrossCountry's managing director Andy Cooper said: 'Our employees have been instrumental in raising funds for CHICKS over the past 12 months. There is a real passion within CrossCountry for the charity which was underlined by Kerry Cross' out-of-the-ordinary sky dive and of course generous donations from those within our Birmingham head office.'

Roy Endacott, chief Executive of CHICKS said: 'I am delighted to be accepting this cheque from CrossCountry and would like to thank everyone in the head office and Kerry in particular for her brave feat.

'CrossCountry have also been donating free train tickets to the children to travel to our two CHICKS retreats and this has made such a difference to the service that we can offer the children.'

CrossCountry's 1,600 employees also have the opportunity to work with the children visiting CHICKS as volunteers at their retreats in Devon and Cornwall.