The following information from OPC provides an interesting look at how a professional outdoor organistaion has addressed the challenges and issues raised by a significant incident and has taken a fresh look at risk analysis and safety management.
The Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre of New Zealand (OPC) would like to let you know about the new safety section of our website. We have developed this for several reasons:
- To help schools to more easily access the information they require to meet the Ministry of Education, Education Outside of the Classroom guidelines.
- To provide more detailed information for clients and parents to make better informed decisions about participation in activities.
- To share our newly developed safety systems with others.
- To provide a central place from which to share the extensive learning that is resulting from the Mangatepopo tragedy.
The website can be viewed at www.opc.org.nz/safety.
Within the Mangatepopo section we have included a summary of the learning which has come from our own internal safety reviews, the independent review team appointed by OPC’s Trust Board and from the Coroner as well as an introduction to what OPC has done in response to these things. This is a good place to start for anyone wanting to understand more about the main things which have been identified as necessary learning from the tragedy and what OPC has done, or is doing about these things.
We have included the full recommendations from both the independent review team and the Coroner and details of our actions in response. A hard copy of the full independent review team report is available on request through the website.
The team at OPC are really keen to engage in more extensive discussion with others in the outdoors industry around safety, so that we all continue to make improvements in this arena. There is so much to learn from each other, so please do contact us and start a dialogue.
The Team at OPC