Although rowing is a very safe sport, sometimes incidents occur.
British Rowing monitors safety incidents in rowing in order to reduce the possibility of them happening again. This is done through the incident reporting system.
The incident reporting system is confidential and available to everyone; clubs, individuals (members and non-members) and events to report an incident or concern.
Incidents that cause harm or damage, however trivial, should be reported as well as those where an injury, health issue or damage has occurred. Near misses should also be reported as these can provide useful information that may help someone to avoid a serious incident in the future and help to identify trends that can be addressed by British Rowing.
Reports should be made online within 24 hours of the incident here. Further guidance on incident reporting is available through RowSafe.
Responsibilities of the club
The club, through the Rowing Safety Adviser and Committee needs to promote to members what constitutes an incident and a near miss that needs reporting and how to do this. Clubs are also required to keep members up to date on incidents that have occurred and ways to avoid them in the future. More detail on this is available through RowSafe.
An incident report should contain:
- Detailed summary of the incident or near incident, including date, time, boats IDs, crew members, light, wind and stream conditions.
- Sketch showing positions of boats, obstructions, directions of travel and stream.
- Statements from witnesses, those involved, in other boats or on the bank.
- Details of any injuries and any medical treatment administered, and where relevant the name of the first aider.
- Details of any measures taken to prevent re-ocurrence.