Windy Tops

Tag: outdoor training new zealand

  • Good insight on river safety

    Earlier today Toni Burgess (aka AntNZ) posted an excellent article about river safety in New Zealand. I’ve written about river safety on this blog in the past, yet Toni’s article, which also draws on expertise from Heather Grady of Outdoor Training NZ, really manages to put some of the less intuitive aspects in perspective.

    For example, on braided rivers:

    …a recent Te Araroa group took the decision to cross the Rangitata River, it took them 2 hours and this river is known to be in full flood with no channels showing within an hour. So essentially you could be half way across the river, finding yourself on a shrinking island of shifting river bed.

    If you spend any time around rivers, or suspect you might in the future, it’s a highly worthwhile read.

  • A New Era for Outdoor Safety Training

    In February I wrote about the structural changes in the Mountain Safety Council, with an expression of concern. A reference which I’d included if I’d known of it was the the MSC’s own explanation of the changes, which is buried in the depths of its website.

    The bubble diagram towards the end of that page represents what’s happening quite well. The MSC is removing nearly all of its outdoor safety training, will no longer be setting any safety standards, and instead will shift to a more hands-off model of producing safety messages and collecting information. Reasoning is provided, but the end result is that most of the excellent training programmes and material which the MSC produced, for amateurs and by amateurs, will no longer be available through the Mountain Safety Council in future.

    This has caused concern in many circles, which I’m inclined to agree with. For roughly five decades now, the Mountain Safety Council has been synonymous in New Zealand with research, setting of standards, training and expertise for bushcraft, river safety, alpine and climbing skills, avalanche safety, firearms safety, outdoor leadership and outdoor first aid. It’s impressive that the sustained activity in these has mostly come from volunteers, not just to help around the edges but to be fundamentally involved, become experts and to train others up to a high level.

    As linked in February, the upcoming move to do away with most training programmes, and then sideline volunteers from the organisation as newly superfluous to requirements (unless they want to simply help with token tasks around the edges) has not gone down well with some of those volunteers.
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