Geocaching Risk Assessment Template

Typical hazards & measures

• Heritage structures and fragile walls — Forbid dismantling cairns, dry-stone walls or historic features to retrieve caches, have a leader inspect any hide in such settings first, apply “look with eyes, not hands” around mortar joints, and substitute a new task where retrieval would risk structural damage.
• Water hazards (rivers, canals, ponds, tides) — Keep groups well back from edges, prohibit pupil wading and lone retrieval, station an adult within arm’s reach at narrow banks and bridges, carry a throw line where appropriate, consult tides or river levels, and move to an alternative cache if water risk is elevated.
• Tools and reaching equipment — Forbid ladders, magnets near traffic, long poles under power lines or improvised fishing; if a reach aid is essential, an adult uses it in clear space with spotters, and any cache demanding specialist tools is skipped or replaced with a safe equivalent task.
• Battery failure and power management — Fully charge devices, carry a shared power bank and paper maps, download offline maps and hints, nominate at least two adults with navigation devices, and continue on a pre-agreed fallback route if one device fails or power falls below a safe threshold.
• Device distraction while walking — Instruct pupils to stop moving before looking at screens, assign one navigator per pair while the partner watches the path, prohibit headphones during movement, and use a clear “phones down at hazards” cue so screen use never competes with kerbs, cyclists, steps or uneven ground.