Disability Awareness Training at AHOY

Tideway volunteers gathered recently at The Ahoy Centre for a day of disability awareness training. Besides the Tideway contingent there were volunteers from Ahoy and also Shadwell Basin Centre. The day was a mixture of classroom and practical sessions with role-play to give us a basic idea of the difficulties experienced by disabled sailors negotiating everyday situations such as busy dinghy parks! This included guiding blind and visually impaired individuals and attempting to communicate without hearing.

We all agreed that we learnt a huge amount and at the same time forged better links with our sailing neighbours at Ahoy and Shadwell with whom we do have a lot in common. Some of what we learnt is already being put into action to make Tideway a friendlier, safer and more accessible place to sail. Our thanks to Ahoy for hosting the session and we hope more of our volunteers can attend and future training days.