Open Air Business October/November 2018

EVENTS
It Couldn’t
Happen to Me!
Two NOEA members share their close shave stories
highlighting the importance of risk mitigation at events –
the theme of this year’s NOEA convention
THIS YEAR the National Outdoor Events
Association (NOEA) Annual Convention
has the theme, ‘It Couldn’t Happen to Me’
and will focus on the many risks that event
organisers and production specialists go
through to put an event on.
This is back to classic NOEA territory;
we’re the only association that has strict
accreditation criteria to membership,
and because of this, can assure event
professionals that by working with NOEA
members, you have trusted partners that
will be there for you.
This is a really important theme, because
it is almost impossible to predict what could
go wrong at an event, and sometimes we
can only learn from those that have already
learned the hard way.
The convention will create a ‘safe’
environment where event professionals can
share their stories, good and bad, what they
learned and most importantly what others
can learn to protect their events from the
complacency that announces, 'it couldn't
happen to me!'
As a taster, we have two stories from
people brave enough to share their own
experience of events that just don’t go to
plan…
It couldn't
happen to me!
BECKY STEVENS,
HYBRED EVENTS
If I had a pound for every time someone
said, ‘that wouldn’t happen’ when I showed
them a risk assessment I’d be writing this
from a beach in the Caribbean.
The list of things that ‘would never
happen’ at events I have worked on over
the past 20 years is long and includes:
› A marquee not being properly fixed and
blowing away despite six rather large
security staff trying to hold onto to it
› The time it rained solidly for two days and
the stages started to sink into the mud
› Toilets flooding because the organiser
wanted to ‘save money’ and hadn’t
booked an ‘empty and clean’ overnight
› The wrong type of fencing being
delivered, resulting in the police having to
close a major A-road as people egressed
onto it
› People climbing fences
› A wasp nest in a medical tent
› Lampposts falling over and blocking a
road on a half marathon route (luckily
before the race started!)
› People being sick from eating too
many sweets given out by kind hearted
residents
› A suspect package on a parade route
requiring bomb disposal experts and a
quick re-route of a parade through a city
centre.
The list goes on… What can we learn from
these? In the case of the suspect package,
it highlighted the importance of effective
multi agency working. Because we had
looked at an incident on the parade route
in a tabletop meeting, the team was able
to come together quickly and effectively to
look at alternatives and different options
for re-routing. We were able to re-deploy
staff quickly and communicate to the
bus company to enable them to re-route
buses. Since that incident, a more detailed
contingency plan has been developed
which now breaks the parade and the route
down into manageable sections so if an
incident of any kind (suspect package, gas
leak, fire etc.) occurs the parade in some
format would be able to continue.
GETTY IMAGES
Because I’ve experienced all these
things it means I am more confident and
competent when looking for hazards and
risks. It also means I’m more prepared
to speak out when something isn’t right;
sometimes the safest thing is to cancel
or postpone rather than to push on. But
this is a hard decision to make when you
know that hundreds of hours of work and
dedication has gone into delivering the
event.
It’s important that those of us who
have grown with the industry and have
experienced many different challenges
share our knowledge and skills. By learning
from everyone’s mistakes and problems the
industry can develop and evolve. New event
organisers need the benefit of experienced
organisers to help them avoid some
common pitfalls. This is where NOEA can
help. By bringing together people from all
different backgrounds and experiences we
can improve the industry and work together
to not make the same mistakes twice.
This year’s NOEA conference theme gives
an opportunity for us to put our hand up
and say ‘it did happen to me and this is
what I learned’.
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