The Adventure Activities Licensing Authority (AALA) came into existence in April 1996. The Health and Safety Executive is currently designated as the AALA.
Adventure activities licensing ensures that activity providers follow good safety management practices.
These should allow young people to experience exciting and stimulating activities outdoors without being exposed to avoidable risks of death or disabling injury.
There are four broad groups of activities that are covered by licensing that include Caving, Climbing, Trekking and Watersports, watercraft specifically deployed by the Canoe Sports Trust include:
- Canoes, kayaks and stand up paddle boards propelled by paddles.
- Rafts which are improvised from various materials.
The most familiar watersports activities include canoeing, kayaking, dragon boating, wave skiing, white-water rafting, improvised rafting, sailing, sailboarding and windsurfing. For any of these activities to be licensable, they need to be done on ‘specified water’ – this is the sea, tidal waters (eg estuaries), inland waters more than 50 metres from the nearest land excluding any island or on turbulent inland waters.
You can be assured that any organisation in possession of an AALA licence certificate has been checked to ensure their equipment, processes and allocation of instructors to different activities adhere to government recommended guidelines.
Our license number is L64505 a copy of which can be provided on request.
