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The IRATA Story
Created in response to a specific need – the inspection and maintenance of offshore oil platforms – IRATA has spent the following twenty years providing operational solutions to the work-at-height and confined access sectors and, in doing so, has constantly shown its procedures to be more effective and efficient than many of the mechanised access systems available to the market. Furthermore, it has shown that rope access, when undertaken by a professionally trained and well-supervised workforce operating to set and established procedures, can deliver safe working to a level unmatched by other methods.
Once IRATA members had proved themselves offshore it was quickly seen that rope access had many applications onshore too. Today, IRATA teams can be seen at work on the world’s great iconic buildings, both old and new, as well as your local city centre or industrial complex; it also is widely used in the natural environment such as cliffs and rock formations and has greatly expanded its work portfolio offshore.
Industrial rope access is a means by which workmen can get to a position where they can safely apply themselves to the work required and, with modern building design creating ever more challenging and extravagant shapes and at greater heights, rope access technicians can work around shapes and features that prohibit the use of other forms of access.
IRATA International is a trade association run by its members. Recent years have seen the organisation grow at a remarkable pace to a point where it has member companies in every continent who collectively work in excess of 2.5 million hours on ropes every year; a substantial number of rope access technicians are trained and assessed every year and some 40000 are currently registered with the Association.
In the 21st century this non-mechanised means of access is destined to become an ever-increasing choice for those commissioning safe work at height. IRATA International is proud to have led the way with its training standards and operational excellence into many countries with the result that safer work methods have been adopted.